Bharti Airtel to launch 3G services in First Week of February 2011

After the government cleared the decks for video calling on mobile phones in last week of January 2011, India's largest telecom operator Bharti Airtel said it will commercially launch 3G mobile services by first week of February

The launch of Mobile number portability and the green signal to commencemnet of video calls has created a great excitement among the mobile subscribers in India. The telecom operators are now busy rolling out the services based upon these policy initiatives. " We will make the announcement for the commercial launch of our 3G service in the next six to seven days," Bharti Airtel chief executive officer ( CEO) Sanjay Kapoor said.

Bharti has given contracts to leading global vendors Ericsson India, Nokia Siemens Networks and Huawei Technologies to set up infrastructure for providing 3G services in India.

These vendors would plan, design, deploy and maintain 3GHSPA ( third generation, high speed packet access) networks in 13 telecom circles where the firm has won 3G licences.

Bharti Airtel had close to 15 crore mobile subscribers in India as on December 31, 2010. It had won spectrum ( radio waves) for 3G services in 13 of the country's 22 telecom service areas in the auction held by the government during May last year.