Bharti Airtel's second quarter conference call, yesterday, was focused mostly on its operation in the African continent, and how it is restructuring the Zain operations that it acquired. A roundup of all the Africa data and discussion, mostly with Manoj Kohli, CEO (International) & Joint Managing Director of Bharti Airtel, from the conference call for Q2-11: - Airtel Brand Launch: in the next week or so. Wont just be a brand launch, Kohli said, but also about improving experience: network, call center service, product, services. Airtel will be "Branding and repositioning the companys approach in each country. New innovations, new offers, which will surprise the customers and the government in a positive way. I think the next 5-6 months post launch will be important." - Arresting declining trends: Kohli said that Airtel has arrested the declining trends in revenues and EBITDA in Africa, which were largely due to lack of investment and market participation by Zain. Airtel is redefining strategy country by country, and says it is seeing positive trends - Addressing unsustainable tariffs, but no price war: Kohli said that Airtel withdrew unsustainable tariffs in 10 out of 16 markets. In some markets, Zain had priced services at 30-40% premioum over its closest competitor, and this was harming its marketshare for the last many quarters, and was unsustainable. "We thought that as the first flush, we should correct this," Kohli said, hastening to add that it's not that Airtel doesn't charge a premium in some markets. "We have sustainable…
