COMPETITIVE ADVANTAGE Bharti Airtels competitive advantage can be seen right from the period of 1990s.

Bharti was the first Indian company to manufacture cordless telephones. Acquisitions and joint ventures One of their main competitive advantages is their acquisitions and joint ventures. Starting from the time they entered this telecom circle in Delhi till today Airtel is clear with the ideaof making strategic alliances. When Airtel initially rolled out its service in the name Bharti tele ventures in Delhi it also went into an agreement with Siemens to market tele phone terminals under Siemens and Beetel brand names. For a company into the telecom service business cannot maintain growth without expansion. Whenever Airtel entered a new state in India it was only through the acquisition of an existing player in that state. Airtel entered Andhra Pradesh and Karnataka by acquiring stakein JT Mobiles. It entered Kolkata by acquiring Spice cell. Airtel entered Tamil Nadu by acquiring Sky cell in Chennai circle. This is how Airtel is even trying now to make its global presence by acquiring Zain in Africa. Outsourcing 14

Retaining the core business and outsourcing the allied activities is an effective strategy followed by Airtel. Due to its rapid growing customer base Airtel outsourced its customer service operations to various BPOs and signed agreements with major IT companies like IBM and CISCO to manage the back end operations of its customer service activities. Supplier Relationships and Integrations Change is something which any business has to undergo to maintain its competitive advantage. Providing voice transfer in telecom business has become an outdated model now. Data transfer is the idea in which all telecom players are concentrating now. After the public sector telecom operator, Airtel leads all other players in providing this data transfer right from the time it started with its GPRS service for mobile phones and now the largest private player to provide the new 3G service. Airtel also has expanded its business by entering the broadband service as a part of its forward integration. It has also acquired stake with Indus and also has its own Bharti Infratel which provides tower solutions which is a part of backward integration. Also the relationships that Airtel maintains with its suppliers are all long term relationships. Going back to the initial agreement with IBM which is a 10 year contract, the contract with Siemens which it still has right from the time of Airtels incorporation