Last week, Bharti Airtel, India's largest mobile operator by subscribers, announced the launch of 3G Mobile services in the National Capital Region (NCR), across Delhi, Gurgaon, Faridabad and Noida. Delhi is home-base for Airtel, and the launch follows previous launches in Bengaluru, Chennai, Coimbatore, Mysore, Manipal, Udipi and Jaipur, where it has managed to acquire half a million customers on 3G. Airtel is targeting 40 cities by the end of this month, and 1000 cities by the same time next year, Atul Bindal, President (Mobile Services) for Bharti Airtel told us. In Part 1 of this two part interview, Bindal talks about data trends since 3G launch, and the companys approach to 3G in terms of on-deck versus off-deck, and 4G-LTE. MediaNama: What are the Data trends that you are observing in the market? Atul Bindal: We thought that we were adequately prepared to ride this wave, but quite frankly nothing could have prepared us for the kind of reception and the response that we have received in the first few weeks, both in terms of the surge, the quantity, as well as the quality. I'm also particularly pleased that we did take the time that we did take in terms of opening each of these cities. I'm not saying this just for effect - we could have been standing up in October and actually announcing 20 cities open, because everything was in place - but our learning from our partners in SingTel and others in the Western World is…
