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Sunil Mittal has built Bharti Airtel into a budding conglomerate, venturing into markets from telecom to insurance, from retail to agriculture. Mittal foresees consolidation in the Indian mobile sector, as new operators fail to achieve the necessary scale for survival.
Sunil Mittal has built Bharti Airtel into a budding conglomerate, venturing into markets from telecom to insurance, from retail to agriculture. Mittal foresees consolidation in the Indian mobile sector, as new operators fail to achieve the necessary scale for survival.
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Sunil Mittal has built Bharti Airtel into a budding conglomerate, venturing into markets from telecom to insurance, from retail to agriculture. Mittal foresees consolidation in the Indian mobile sector, as new operators fail to achieve the necessary scale for survival.
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The Basic facts NAME Sunil Bharti Mittal TITLE Chairman and Group CEO COMPANY Bharti Enterprises HEADQUARTERS New Delhi C_EBR_209.indd 10 09-05-28 14.55.42 EF t2 2009 11 Indiantiger watch out for his next move TEXT Nathan Hegedus PHOTO Chris Maluszynski I T IS EASY TO tell when Sunil Mittal embarks on a major project he stops eating meat. In the early 1,,os, when Mit- tal was bidding on his first mobile phone project, he vowed to be a vegetarian until he could talk on my own phone. Three years later, Mittal resumed eating meat. But Mittal, and his ventures into vegetarianism, did not stop there. Today Bharti Airtel has about 1oo million custom- ers who use 1. billion minutes a day, and Mittal has built Bharti Airtels parent company, Bharti Enterprises, into a budding conglomerate, venturing into markets from telecom to insurance, from retail to agriculture. In India, Mittals resolution to give up meat is not unu- Mittal says Bharti Airtel may have bene- fited from not being among the first opera- tors to introduce 3G. Early 3G was poor and expensive, he says. We missed all that. Now the technology has evolved. C_EBR_209.indd 11 09-05-28 14.55.44 12 EF t2 2009 Background check SCHOOLS Punjab University, Harvard Business School. Started bicycle parts factory in hometown of Ludhiana As background checks go, Mittals is one of the easier because he has had only one job in his whole career, though that job has involved a huge variety of things the hallmark of the entrepreneur. cover story Sunil Mittal Mittal foresees consolidation in the Indian mobile sector, as new operators fail to achieve the neces- sary scale for survival. And, worldwide, con- solidation will also remain more regional. There are just limited synergies between continents, he says. Numbers of wireless subscribers Number of wireless subscribers India numbers include GSM, CDMA and WLL-F 0 50 100 150 200 250 300 350 400 March 2009 Dec 2008 Dec 2007 Dec 2006 Dec 2005 Dec 2004 Dec 2003 Dec 2002 India Bharti Source: Telecom Regulatory Authority of India Million 1 0 . 7 7 2 . 7 7 2 8 . 4 4 5 . 5 4 8 9 . 8 7 5 . 9
1 6 . 3 1 4 9 . 6 3 1 . 2 5 5 . 2 2 3 3 . 6 3 4 6 . 9 3 9 1 . 8 8 5 . 7 9 3 . 9 Subscriber numbers for Bharti Airtel and the Indian mobile market as a whole grew by more than 3000 percent between December, 2002 and March, 2009. The Telecom Regu- latory Authority of India includes GSM, CDMA and WLL (wireless local loop) in its national wireless market figures, though WLL is not a statistically significant factor in the markets recent growth. C_EBR_209.indd 12 09-05-28 14.55.46 EF t2 2009 13 sual his wife gives up chocolate during their three childrens school exams but what is unusual is Mittals savvy balance between a masterful negotiation of the Indian market and his application of les- sons learned from decades of cooperation with foreign companies. Mittal is a man raised in the heart of Indian politics, who built a telecom giant in an economy just opening after decades of relative isolation. He is also a man who learned the value of long hours and preci- sion in Japan, who came to appreciate strong engineering and high-quality design in Germany, and who flipped outsourcing trends on their head by looking to Euro- pean companies to run his networks. India is often symbolized by the tiger. And the booming and liberalized Indian economy has lived up to this big cat image in recent years, as has Bharti Airtel, now the largest mobile operator in India and the third-largest national operator in the world. Today Indian companies are venturing off the subcontinent, looking to make a global mark. Bharti Airtel is no exception. Last year Mittal pursued a merger with pan-African operator r: to create the largest telecom company in the world. The deal fell through, but Mittal remains on the prowl. We have a business model that works in emerging countries and can be replicated, if you look at our pathbreaking models of out- sourcing things like networks, i: and call centers, he says. And we want to test it. ITS ALL ABOUT SCALE Telecom is all about scale, says Mittal big scale, scale on the order of tens of millions of customers. This is especially true in India, which has the lowest tariffs in the world, around uso o.o1 per minute. Without scale here, you drown in losses. And in an ultracompet- itive market of o million subscribers and growing, Mittal has all the size he needs, with a z percent customer market share and a o percent revenue market share. It is how you survive, Mittal says. It is nothing but math. But Mittal is not content to rest on scale. He wants to leverage it, both to develop India from the inside and to bring India into the global spotlight. In zoo8, Bharti Airtel and r: agreed in principle on what Mittal calls a uso o bil- lion merger of equals. The deal fell apart at the last minute, dashing Mittals hopes of transforming Bharti Airtel, as expressed in a company statement, from a home- grown Indian company to a true Indian multinational telecom giant, symbolizing the pride of India. Almost a year later, he still looks disap- pointed. r: was a great fit and still is, he says. In late May, after this interview was conducted, Mittal reopened merger talks with r:. Mittal says he will continue to focus on emerging markets for any future acquisi- tion bids, though he sounds intrigued by possibilities in Europe. Can someone grow their minutes in Europe while lower- ing the tariff at the same time he asks. I dont know. In the end, Mittal dismisses all specula- tion except to say, We want to go out, that is for sure. JAPANESE LESSONS Mittal is the fourth-richest man in India and the ninth-richest cvo in the world, with his family worth about uso ;.; bil- lion, according to Forbes magazine. Yet Mittal walks alone, and quickly, through the halls of Bharti Enterprises relatively modest corporate headquarters in New Delhi. He is friendly but focused, smiling easily and answering fast, with an air of finality to each on-message response. Mittal is a self-made billionaire, and his tale of tenacity is etched into the algo- rithms of internet search engines. The son of a politician, he borrowed uso 1oo to start a bicycle crankshaft factory in his hometown of Ludhiana, Punjab. He built a booming business importing generators from Japan, and he has said that in Japan he internationalized my concepts, learned the art of diplomacy in international trade. The generator business died when the government banned his imports, doling out exclusive domestic licenses instead. He dis- covered the electronic pushbutton phone in Taiwan and moved into telecom in 1,86, his Bharti TeleTech remains the dominant man- ufacturer of landline phones in India. Mittals big break came in 1,,z, when the government began issuing licenses for mobile phone services, and Mittal won the bid for the Delhi circle. Other operators foundered in oceans of debt, but Mittal picked his spots for acquisitions and expansions well, slowly climbing toward profitability and market dominance. Mittal credits his foreign partner- ships unusual for India back then for his companys success. Over the years, he has worked with Ericsson, Nokia, Siemens, n:, :x:, Telecom Italia, inr and Vivendi, among others. For a young company to tie in with these behemoths, they must have seen something special, he says. One of Mittals most dramatic foreign moves came in zoo, when he signed an agreement to outsource much of his net- work infrastructure. It was about effi- ciency, Mittal says. Who knows the net- work best The manufacturer. Why not have them run it for us Outsourcing allowed Bharti Airtel to scale up very quickly, Mittal says, and focus on distribution, brand, innovation in services, and collection. He emphasizes that the outsourcing was done for practi- cal, not financial, reasons and that all of the companys networks remain on the books. But he would not mind if they were off. Our ultimate goal is to get to the state where we just buy minutes off the net- work, a network which could serve two or three companies, he says. But that is still some time away. THE GAME CHANGER For all his interest in the outside world, Mittal continues to delve deeper into India, both within telecom and in a series of initiatives in retail, insurance and agri- culture. Within telecom, G is the game changer, but not the way most people might think, he says. In the us and Europe, G will be centered in urban areas. In India, Mittal believes G will make the most impact in rural villages, where Indias crushing pov- erty is at its worst and where Bharti Airtel has opened zo,ooo service centers in recent months. Many of these villages have never seen a fixed line, or any form of connectivity, he says. They have only been connected through wireless. They need broadband. Imagine putting a handheld computer in every village. It is a powerful thought. Even in India, with its 1.1 billion people, the mobile phone market will plateau. In India we are seeing growth now of zo to z percent, not 1oo percent, he says. Mittal says that he and his executive team (which includes his two brothers, Akhil Gupta, deputy group cvo, and a dozen other professionals) know two things well telecom and India but that the two do not have to be linked. We have done telecom in India, he says. But there is more firepower, more financial resources, available to be put Our ultimate goal is to get to the state where we just buy minutes off the network, a network which could serve two or three companies. But that is still some time away. C_EBR_209.indd 13 09-05-28 14.55.46 14 EF t2 2009 into other parts of India. We cannot let India go by. Mittal has launched a series of new cus- tomer-facing businesses in the same way he built his telecom empire, with foreign part- nerships in long-insulated and mas- sive domestic markets. These moves are highlighted by a partnership with the us retail giant Wal-Mart to open multibrand stores that Mittal hopes will redefine Indian retail. Mittal has also teamed up with x in life insurance and asset management, and with Del Monte Foods in agriculture. Mittal says that, ultimately, he is a business- man, an entrepreneur and an industry player, not a politician or spokesman for India. But he has also called Bharti Airtel an Indian champion, and he is clearly trying to build an Indian business giant, not an untethered mul- tinational. This sense of national purpose and pride seems to drive much of his quest to export India to the world and import the world to India. In a recent television interview, Mittal was asked whether he is eating meat, because when he stops, something big occurs. It so happens that Mittal went vegetarian again early this year, though he says he has no spe- cific project in mind. Maybe this time it is for the general good of mankind! he jokes. Mittals eating habits and personal resolu- tions are not the real reason to follow Bharti Enterprises. Mittal is worth watching because in his moves there is always a complex inter- play between the Indian and the international. He is worth watching because the stakes in his moves only get higher, whether he is building a worldwide telecom giant or helping transform the Indian countryside. M Many of these villages have never seen a xed line, or any form of connectivity. They have only been connected through wireless. They need broadband. Imagine putting a handheld computer in every village. It is a powerful thought. Where do you see yourself a year from now? FOR THE NEXT YEAR I will be strengthening our organizational structure, tak- ing a clear view on new projects and their trajectory. What about in 10 years? IN YEARS, I expect the Group to be a successful conglomerate. I have no doubt that Bharti will have internationalized itself within that period and, therefore, I will have spent a lot of time looking at overseas businesses. A founder remains a founder, and whatever job one ends up doing, one is more or less in the same position as the head of the Group. The good news on our front is that we have professionalized our business to a point where it is easy to separate shareholder and managerial responsibility. C_EBR_209.indd 14 09-05-28 14.55.48 EF t2 2009 15 Sunil Mittal cover story A young market The most important thing to know about the Indian economy is that it is young, says Sunil Mit- tal, the chairman of Bharti Enter- prises. FOR DECADES after Indias 1,; independence from the u, the government kept markets largely closed, handing out exclusive licenses that made a few conglomerates and their leaders very rich, hence the term license raj. THE GOVERNMENT began loosen- ing restrictions only in the early 1,,os, and since then India has boomed, transform- ing quickly into an economic powerhouse with a trillion-dol- lar economy. And even in a deep worldwide recession, Indian companies have started looking beyond the subconti- nent, acquiring companies in both emerging and more devel- oped markets. India is no longer a sleepy backwater, says Mittal, who built Indias dominant mobile operator, Bharti Airtel, from scratch. Companies have evolved with high corporate governance and cutting-edge technology and services. They have developed skills in India, and now is the time to go out, as European and American com- panies become available, espe- cially because sectors like man- ufacturing and some services are priced low to acquire. YET ON THE other hand, the open- ing of the domestic economy has sometimes been a start-and- stop affair, with many still per- ceiving it as a somewhat closed shop marked by damaging pro- tectionist limits on foreign investment and imports. Mittal says this is a mispercep- tion, that only a handful of sec- tors such as retail, insurance, defense and banking remain highly regulated. Many countries around the world still restrict foreign involvement in these areas, he says, and further loos- ening of restrictions is on the agenda of the government. MOST OF THE economy is open, he says. You can just come in and set up shop and start oper- ating. But Mittal says that the most important thing to remember about India is, again, youth. India is a country of 1.1 bil- lion with percent of the pop- ulation under z years of age, he says. It is a continent of con- sumers. As the world struggles to find growth, India is only struggling to regain momentum. The growth is there. M C_EBR_209.indd 15 09-05-28 14.55.49