Bharti to spend $800 mn on Zain Africa this fiscal

Bharti Airtel will spend up to $800 million (about Rs 3,565 crore) this fiscal on setting up infrastructure network for its new acquisition Zain Africa.

"Last year Zain spent $800 million as capex for its African operations. I do not expect this year we will spend significantly higher than this amount as capex for Zain Africa," Joint Managing Director and CFO Akhil Gupta said here.

For India, the capex for 2G network would be in the range of $1.5-1.8 billion, he added. The figure excludes expenditure on tower business.

Gupta said the company is looking at opportunities for raising equity for the tower business, but it could only be done once the full-year financial of the tower business is out. "We are looking at the equity raising opportunities which includes an IPO for our tower business," he said.

Asked about when the company would include Zain financial into its balance sheet, he said we are currently in the process of closing the acquisition, which should happen soon. Once the acquisition closes, the figures will flow into our financials.