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Airtel acquires 10 percent stake in AI startup Voicezen

25May By AdityaNo Comments

ACQUISITION

Airtel acquires 10 percent stake in AI startup Voicezen

Indian telecom company Bharti Airtel acquires 10 percent stake in Gurgaon-based start-up Voicezen, which focusses on conversational artificial intelligence technologies, in an all-cash deal, the private operator said on Thursday. The stake purchase will give Bharti Airtel preferred access to Voicezen’s technologies, which can be deployed across its customer touch points in multiple languages, Airtel said in a statement without disclosing the amount it paid for buying the stake. The acquisition has been made by the company under its fast expanding Airtel Startup Accelerator Programme, the company noted. “AI is a big focus area for Airtel given the deep positive impact the technology can have in transforming customer experience. Voicezen has built some promising products that are ve...

17Feb By AnkitaNo Comments

INDIA

After Court Order, Indian Telecom Airtel Pays Rs 10,000 crore dues

With the government coming down heavily on telcos after the Supreme Court's rap, Bharti Airtel said it has paid Rs 10,000 crore to the telecom department towards statutory dues. The company said it will make payment of balance amount after self-assessment exercise. "The...amount of Rs 10,000 crore has been paid on behalf of Bharti Airtel, Bharti Hexacom, and Telenor," the Sunil Mittal-led company said in a statement. As much as Rs 9,500 crore has been paid on behalf of Bharti Airtel (including Telenor India which merged with the company), and another Rs 500 crore for Bharti Hexacom. As per the government's assessment, Airtel owes nearly Rs 35,586 crore in statutory dues, including licence fee and spectrum usage charge. After facing the ire of the Supreme Court for putting on...

Security Flaw in Airtel app exposes Customers Data, Fixed Now

9Dec By Press Trust of IndiaNo Comments

News

Security Flaw in Airtel app exposes Customers Data, Fixed Now

An independent cyber security researcher found technical flaws in an application of Bharti Airtel that exposed "sensitive user information" which the company claims to have fixed now. According to the cyber security researcher Ehraz Ahmed the flaw existed in one of the Airtel app that allows "to fetch sensitive user information of any Airtel subscriber.""It revealed information like first and last name, gender, email, date of birth, address, subscription information, device capability information for 4G, 3G & GPRS, network information, activation date, user type (prepaid or postpaid) And current IMEI number," Ahmed said in his blog. The IMEI number is a unique number that can be used to identify the device of the user. "Every user that is on India's Airtel network was at risk ...

Airtel Acquihire Logistics Startup Quikmile

25Nov By AdityaNo Comments

ACQUISITION

Airtel Acquihire Logistics Startup Quikmile

Telecom company Bharti Airtel acquihire Gurgaon based Quikmile, a startup focused on building tech-enabled logistics platforms for India. The company did not disclose the size of the 'acquihire' deal, which typically entails the acquisition of people or teams. "Quikmile's team will now be a part of Airtel X Labs Airtel's digital innovation factory, which focuses on IoT, Digital Engineering, Artificial Intelligence, and Machine Learning," Airtel said in a statement. Airtel X Labs team comprises of professionals from India and abroad, the statement said, adding that it is building advanced digital capabilities to serve the emerging needs of Digital India and is rapidly scaling up its teams and scope of work. Quikmile, which started operations in 2018, aims to harness the power of...

Airtel acquires Stakes in Vahan, Launched Startup Accelerator Program

25Oct By AdityaNo Comments

ACQUISITION

Airtel acquires Stakes in Vahan, Launched Startup Accelerator Program

Bharti Airtel has acquired stake in Bengaluru-based AI startup Vahan and also launched its first startup accelerator. Airtel's Startup Accelerator will enable early startups get access to Airtel's online and offline distribution network, deep market understanding and ecosystem of global strategic partners. Airtel developed in-house capabilities around machine learning and artificial intelligence which could be leveraged to aid the growth of startups. Airtel also announced the induction of Bengaluru-based tech startup Vahan into its Startup Accelerator Program. "Airtel will acquire a stake in Vahan and partner with them in building significant scale to achieve their vision of enabling jobs for the next billion internet users," the statement added. Founded in 2016, and backed...

Netflix Expands its Partnership With Airtel in India

27Aug By Gauri SinghNo Comments

Tech

Netflix Expands its Partnership With Airtel in India

The popular video streaming platform Netflix has reportedly expanded its partnership with Airtel in India to offer three month free subscriptions to new and existing subscribers of select Airtel Postpaid and V-Fiber Home Broadband plans. As a part of this partnership, the Airtel postpaid users will now enjoy free service for three months along with the ability to pay for subsequent subscriptions through their bills. This is for those who are not eligible for this service and will be able to sign up for Netflix through Airtel’s apps and pay for their subscription using their Airtel bill. "Partnerships are at the core of Airtel’s DNA and we are delighted to expand our strategic relationship with Netflix. We look forward to working closely with Netflix to leverage this huge potential and ...

Airtel Reported First Ever Loss in Indian Telecom Sector

27Jul By NitishNo Comments

BUSINESS

Airtel Reported First Ever Loss in Indian Telecom Sector

India's one of the leading telecom company Bharti Airtel reported first ever loss of Rs 940 crore in the first quarter (June 2018) from its Telecom business. Airtel bleeds to retain market dominance in the face of free voice calls and dirt cheap tariffs from Reliance Jio, Vodaphone & idea. Bharti Airtel's India performance continued to face turbulence from the ongoing tariff war despite high level of investments and increase in usage of services. The average revenue per user on Bharti Airtel's India network declined by around 32 percent to Rs 105 from Rs 154 per network on a year-on-year basis. With the acquisition of Telenor's India business, the mobile subscriber base of Airtel increased by 28 percent to 344.6 million as on June 30, 2018, compared to 280.6 million in the ...

CTO of Bharti Airtel And Reliance Jio Quit

23Jul By AnkitaNo Comments

News

CTO of Bharti Airtel And Reliance Jio Quit

Chief expertise officers of telecom operators Reliance Jio and Bharti Airtel have resigned from their respective firms. Reliance Jio Infocomm Limited is the most well-known Indian mobile network operator, owned by Reliance Industries and headquartered in Mumbai, Maharashtra. It operates a national LTE network with coverage across 22 telecom circles. It does not offer 2G or 3G service and instead utilizes voice over LTE to provide voice service on its network. Recently, the Chief Technology Officer of the Reliance jio group, Jagbir Singh, had joined the company before the soft launch of 4G services. Antecedent to this assignment, Jagbir Singh was working with the one of the familiar company known as Samsung. Previously he had also worked with Airtel for a period of ten years. Acco...

Facebook Shared User Data Access With Airtel & Saavn

4Jul By NitishNo Comments

News

Facebook Shared User Data Access With Airtel & Saavn

Social media giant Facebook admitted that they have shared their user's data with Indian telecom company Bharti Airtel and Reliance Jio's music app partner Saavn among others. The social media company said that these all those companies having integration partnerships with Facebook. The integration partners of the company to build ways for Facebook users to receive Facebook or Facebook features on their device or network within platform use policies of the social media firm. "Integration partners were not permitted to use data received through Facebook APIs for independent purposes unrelated to the approved integration without user consent," Facebook said in its submission. According to the information shared by Facebook, its partnership with Airtel is no longer in force. &n...

Reliance Jio’s Growth May Trouble Its Competitors

8Jun By Gauri SinghNo Comments

News

Reliance Jio’s Growth May Trouble Its Competitors

Mukesh Ambani-owned Reliance Jio Infocomm has reported a considerable growth in profits in the March-ended financial year. Reliance Jio saw a net profit of Rs 510 crore in the quarter ended March compared with Rs 504 crore in the previous three months. Jio’s operating revenue increased 3.6 percent reaching to Rs 7,128 crore. The older telecom operators in India like Bharti Airtel and Vodafone India have been growing from the very beginning but since Jio has entered the league, they have been facing a tougher competition. “When the dust settles down and subscribers from beleaguered smaller players have been mopped by the Big Three (Vodafone-Idea combine, Airtel and Jio), the tussle for supremacy will resume,” said Sandip Das, senior advisor at telecom consulting firm Analysys Mason. “Wi...

Airtel TV Crosses 50 Million Downloads on Android: Extends Free Subscription

7Jun By Gauri SinghNo Comments

Tech

Airtel TV Crosses 50 Million Downloads on Android: Extends Free Subscription

India’s popular Delhi-based telecom company Bharti Airtel has publicized that its Android app called Airtel TV has crossed the milestone of 50 million (5 crores) downloads on the Google Play Store. To acknowledge this success, the company has announced that it will be offering a free subscription to the Airtel mobile customers till 31 December 2018. Earlier, Airtel provided free subscription on Airtel TV app to its customers only till June, but now the time period has been extended till the end of this year. The free subscription will be offered to each and every Airtel prepaid and postpaid user. "We are thrilled at achieving this milestone and being able to scale up the app so rapidly. This is a strong endorsement from our users and a result of our unrelenting focus on delivering a wo...

Reliance Jio on a Hiring Spree of Experts Under Akash Ambani

4Jun By Gauri SinghNo Comments

BUSINESS

Reliance Jio on a Hiring Spree of Experts Under Akash Ambani

The Mukesh Ambani-led Reliance Jio Infocomm has started its hunt for a team of experts to work under Akash Ambani regarding the Artificial Intelligence (AI) of the firm. Apart from AI, the company is also seeking for young people to work on machine learning and blockchain technology (a digital ledger in which transactions are recorded). It has been reported that Reliance Jio has already appointed some of the senior officials who are responsible for building this team. Akash Ambani is interestingly getting involved in this process and is being assumed to lead the initiative. The company is planning to set up this team in either of the two cities – Hyderabad or Bengaluru. An artificial intelligence (AI) oriented brand engagement platform called ‘JioInteract’ was launched by Reliance Ji...