Airtel to ring greater success with youthful Sri Lanka

It’s been just two-and-a-half months since Jinesh Hegde took over as Chief Executive Officer and Managing Director of Bharti Airtel Sri Lanka, but he has already covered a greater part of Sri Lankato engage with his ‘superhero’ employees.

Working shoulder to shoulder with them and even dancing to local tunes with those who work on ground at road shows, Jinesh has been very busy to bring Bharti Airtel Sri Lanka to a commanding position. Jinesh believes that there is a huge potential in Sri Lanka’s youth sector for his company and he is not giving up until he covers all of them with their 

extensive coverage. In an interview with Daily FT, Hegde talks about how Bharti Airtel Sri Lanka is planning to attract the youth segment of the country and the company’s future. Following are excerpts:

By Hiyal Biyagamage

Q: Airtel started operations in 2009. You approached the local market with a different flair. Over the last years, you have had your ups and downs. As the new CEO, what is your view on Airtel’s current outlook in Sri Lanka?

A:We have learnt a lot from our experiences in the last five-and-a-half years. Based on our learning and with the fact being that I joined Airtel two-and-a-half months ago, I went and met people as the first thing. I travelled extensively across the country and met almost all of my employees. I met all those young lads who sell our products and services in the field. I went to seven different towns and did roadshows. In these roadshows, my clear message was to stay focused and continue our efforts in what we are really good at, and learn from our mistakes to do things better. 

I am very happy to say that I met a number of partners and distributors and we shared a lot of energy on the ground. I was excited to be amongst them and they said that a CEO has come and met them for the very first time, working with them shoulder to shoulder. That really inspired me. 

I also realised that we are really good in reaching the youth segment of Sri Lanka. Thanks to our initial positioning, we have been able to create good inroads into that. Youth love Airtel and they like the look and feel of the brand. If you ask me what is Airtel’s identity in Sri Lanka; youth of Sri Lanka is Airtel Sri Lanka’s identity. We are leveraging on that. Young people like to explore. They want to explore and be bolder. We have identified many engagement opportunities where they want to express themselves.  

We have been very successful in building relationships with those segments and we would continue those efforts. I believe that is our strength.

Bharti Airtel Sri Lanka Chief Executive Officer and Managing Director Jinesh Hegde  

Q: With cost structures coming down and competitiveness in the industry increasing, do you feel that being the CEO is tough?

A:Yes and no (laughs). Yes because we are the last operator to enter into the market and we are a challenger in the local telco industry. It is tough for us. Nobecause it is an opportunity as well. Since we have very less to lose, we embrace those challenges as opportunities. We see that by doing few things, we will be able to do a lot. They say that less is more so we do few things but achieve maximum results. As I mentioned, our focus will be to prioritise the youth segment. We want to launch a number of products and services which are youth-oriented. 

As far as competitiveness goes, we are continuously challenging ourselves to bring down the cost structure. By improving the way we conduct our business by going for new contracts and identifying new opportunities, we are trying to bring down our operating cost. That will perhaps help us to be competitive in the local market. 

Q: Recently Airtel confirmed that the company would invest further on 3G network expansion which would result in over 75% 3G presence across the island. Can you elaborate on these plans and how it would redefine customer’s data experience? 

A:As I said, our target customers are youth. They are not just in the urban markets but in rural markets as well. This market is heavily becoming digital-savvy and consume digital content on an hourly basis. Many of them have smartphones and their internet penetration is way better than the country average. The youth are looking at products and service which will make them stay connected. 

Right now, we have 1836 sites across the country and from that, 1317 sites have 3G. That is why we are saying we cover almost 75% population with 3G. We cover 90% of the Sri Lankan population through our network. We want to bridge this gap and increase the 3G penetration to 95%. We want to offer 3G services not only to urban areas but to rural areas as well. Airtel will continue to expand in Sri Lanka and broaden the range of product and services. 

Customers are moving some of the consumption from computers to mobile. You see a fast trend that lots of customers want to consume data on the move. There are plenty of digital content to be surfed in the cloud. We see that as an opportunity. The mobile has practically become an inseparable part of our own life which gives the flexibility to consume data on the move. Content are also getting developed locally and globally. As consumption is moving towards mobile, we need to make sure that we expand our 3G network across the country. 

Q: What about introducing 4G LTE to Sri Lanka? Do you have any plans at the moment?

A: At this point of time, 4G depends on the ecosystem. There are very few handsets that support 4G. It is very early for us to get 4G. We have enough opportunities in 3G and we offer pretty decent 3G speeds. On top of 3G usage, 4G penetration will take another two years to really seal in. I guess 3G can meet or current demand.

Q: Data has become a significant part. Airtel concentrates a lot on data and your competitors are also in the same bandwagon. Is there a worthwhile potential for data in the local market?

A:First of all, we would continue to invest this market. We will continue to invest on sites, increase capacity on the current network and increase the footprint of 3G. Having said that, we see that there is an opportunity of many other services on top of the basic internet. Airtel is world’s third largest telecom provider. We have a number of products and services which we have launched in other countries. We want to bring those products to Sri Lanka: for example, Wink Music and Wink Movies. We want to extend these products into Sri Lanka. Wink Music which has Hollywood, Bollywood as well as Tamil content will be launched in Sri Lanka soon. We want to add these kinds of value-added services on top of or basic data structure. I believe these products will excite our customers. 

We are looking at introducing new Airtel products in a one-by-one basis. I am very happy to say that we recently came up with a new campaign which we launched a week back which is very exciting. It is about smart cash technology. It improves data downloading by almost 40%. The digital campaign so far has got more than one million hits. The theme of the campaign is ‘Be Brave’. The actual campaign will be released on the 12th of this month. This is in line with our company’s strategy where we want to be more innovative and engage Sri Lankan youth into exploring new dimensions of technology.

Q: A couple of years back, there was speculations that Airtel was looking at selling its business to another party. What is your take on that?

A:These are some rumours which we don’t respond or react to. Having said that, we are investing heavily in Sri Lanka. Last month, we added 30 sites and as we speak, we are adding another 50 sites. We have plans to expand our network with another 100 sites. I think we are one of the few telco companies that are going into such expansion. We don’t really look at some of these speculations. We have a job in our hand. Our theme is ‘we win every day’. We do our job with a passion so we do not focus much on these rumours.

"I realised that we are really good in reaching the youth segment of Sri Lanka. Thanks to our initial positioning, we have been able to create good inroads into that. Youth love Airtel and they like the look and feel of the brand. If you ask me what is Airtel’s identity in Sri Lanka; youth of Sri Lanka is Airtel Sri Lanka’s identity. We are leveraging on that. Young people like to explore. They want to explore and be bolder. We have identified many engagement opportunities where they want to express themselves

Right now, we have 1836 sites across the country and from that, 1317 sites have 3G. That is why we are saying we cover almost 75% population with 3G. We cover 90% of the Sri Lankan population through our network. We want to bridge this gap and increase the 3G penetration to 95%. We want to offer 3G services not only to urban areas but to rural areas as well. Airtel will continue to expand in Sri Lanka and broaden the range of product and services."

Q: There are discussions that Sri Lankan telco companies have to share networks and invest together to cut broadband costs further. Do you have any comments on that?

A:I must appreciate the regulator here. They have done a very good job and has a very mature approach towards the telco industry. In fact, Sri Lanka is ahead of the curve in the sub-continent. The way Sri Lankan telcos collaborate within the industry keeping customers’ interest in mindis commendable. There is a clear forward-looking policy which is clearly laid out for all of us. I see a good engagement between the industry and the regulator.

Nonetheless, we also have some challenges here. Sri Lanka being a country with such lowest tariffs, we need to be careful if we want to sustain our future investments. We need to strike a balance betweenour stakeholders (customer, regulator and investors) and return on investment. That is one area where we can do better and how can we look at opportunities to collaborate. We also need to see how we can rationalise certain price wars in the industry to avoid too much of a drain in terms of margins. It will make sure that operators keep investing for a better mobile experience. 

We are already sharing some infrastructure. All the operators share each other’s infrastructure so there is collaboration in the back-end so that we can reduce our operational costs. We do not go and set parallel infrastructure unnecessarily. The regulator is enabling that ecosystem for operators which are very appreciative.

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Q: We are currently living in a digital storm. How will Airtel look at creating digital opportunities in Sri Lanka?

A: I think we should leave it to the consumer. Consumers are far more intelligent and they are ahead of the operator. What we can do is keep expanding our network and provide more services. Currently, we have more than 100 partners who work for us. We have four Airtel brand Stores, 29 franchise-run brand stores and 50 rural ‘seva’ centres. We want to expand that network as well and make our services available to more and more people. Expansion of the distribution network will also enable more customers to stay connected and they will automatically consume digital content.  

"I must appreciate the regulator here. They have done a very good job and has a very mature approach towards the telco industry. In fact, Sri Lanka is ahead of the curve in the sub-continent. The way Sri Lankan telcos collaborate within the industry keeping customers’ interest in mindis commendable. There is a clear forward-looking policy which is clearly laid out for all of us. I see a good engagement between the industry and the regulator

As far as competitiveness goes, we are continuously challenging ourselves to bring down the cost structure. By improving the way we conduct our business by going for new contracts and identifying new opportunities, we are trying to bring down our operating cost. That will perhaps help us to be competitive in the local market"

Q: How do you view the future of Airtel Sri Lanka?

A:Very promising indeed. In the last few months, I have met so many people. My experience has been full of inspiration. My meetings in the ground with all those ‘ground warriors’, or I might call them my superheroes (laughs), have made me realise that they are the people who take this company to the next level. They build the brand and make us proud every single day. We will win every day without worrying about big targets. Our progress has been very good and encouraging.  Our focus is around people. We have a very open culture. Since we have put lot of focus for our ground activities, we want to support those people who work really hard out there. We want to help them to deliver their best and for that, we need to create an environment where it is engaging, bring speed to market and improve our speed.     

The smart cash technology we have brought in, I am sure our customers will enjoy that. In the future, we are looking at introducing more products to Sri Lanka. We will keep expanding our network and distribution. With the energetic and exciting team, Airtel Sri Lanka is poised to go into the next level.