Bharti Airtel plans to sell its operations in Bangladesh and Sri Lanka, it emerged late last week.
Sources cited by CNBC-TV18 claimed on Friday that the Indian operator has appointed two banks to advise it on a sale.
The media outlet said Bharti Airtel also plans to sell its towers businesses in Bangladesh and Sri Lanka separately.
According to the report, the company has around 4,000 towers in Bangladesh and 2,500 in Sri Lanka.
"Bharti Airtel Limited keeps evaluating various opportunities, on an ongoing basis in ordinary course of business and will make necessary disclosure as and when required," said Bharti Airtel’s company secretary Rajendra Chopra, in a clarification to the Bombay Stock Exchange.
Bharti Airtel groups the results of its Bangladesh and Sri Lanka operations together as its ‘South Asia’ division. In the second quarter, South Asia generated revenue of 3.89 billion rupees (€51.99 million), down 11% on Q2 2014.
Pretax loss widened to INR992 million (€13.27 million) from INR815 million.
Bharti Airtel’s South Asia customer base increased to 9.02 million at the end of June from 8.65 million a year earlier.
According to the latest figures from GSMA Intelligence, Bangladesh and Sri Lanka together had 144.5 million mobile subscriptions in October 2014, which makes Bharti Airtel a minor player in these markets.
