Western Union partners Bharti Airtel for mobile money transfer in India

In a first-of-its kind agreement, Bharti Airtel and Western Union have decided to jointly develop and pilot a Mobile Money Transfer service in India. This pioneering agreement will usher in the possibility of sending money to India via the mobile phone. Western Union agents presently provide cash remittance services in India. The mobile money transfer service is subject to regulatory approval.

According to The World Bank, the number of immigrants globally is in the region of 200 million - approximately 3% of the world’s population. The World Bank also identifies India as the number one remittance recipient market. Statistics from RBI (Reserve Bank of India) suggest that the inward annual remittance into India stood at over $26 billion for the financial year 2006 - 2007, accounting for 10% of global inward remittance market, which stands at $260 billion.

“We are delighted to work with Western Union in this path-breaking initiative and be at the forefront of enabling international remittance over the mobile for our 50 million mobile phone customers in India. This will help us move remittances via the mobile in a fast and convenient way, supporting low value transactions,” said Mr. Gopal Vittal, Director Marketing & Communications, Bharti Airtel Limited.

Bharti Airtel has an extensive footprint across India and Western Union, together with its affiliates Orlandi Valuta and Vigo, has more than 320,000 agent locations in more than 200 countries and territories. In India, Western Union operates through 45,000 agent locations, including 8,500 post offices and more than 14,000 bank branches across 5000 towns and cities. This programme will enable Indians living abroad to send remittances to their dependents in India in an easy and convenient fashion through the vast networks of both the companies.

“Our association with Bharti Airtel for the Mobile Money Transfer service is an important step in expanding the range of Western Union® global services to a new category of consumers across the country,” said Anil Kapur, Managing Director, Western Union. “This is a very exciting development, especially given the expanse and reach of mobile services in the Indian subcontinent.”

Airtel, recently received approval to launch 2G and 3G mobile services in Sri Lanka, and plans to launch local operations early next year. With just 30% mobile penetration and witnessing a steady growth of approx. 2 million mobile users per annum, Bharti Airtel sees Sri Lanka as a strategic market in its overseas expansion journey and has made an estimated investment of US$ 200 Million in the Sri Lankan market.

The reach and accessibility of mobile networks in developing economies create new opportunities to extend the benefits of financial services to many families for the first time. Mobile networks now cover the majority of the world’s population. Applications that allow a mobile subscriber to view and manage funds on their handset are emerging in select countries as foundation for phone-based financial services.

The relationship with Bharti Airtel developed follows a landmark agreement between Western Union and the GSM Association (GSMA), a global trade association representing over 700 GSM mobile phone operators, to facilitate the development of cross-border mobile money transfer services. Bharti Airtel chairs the GSM Association’s Mobile Money Transfer steering committee, a group of 35 mobile network operators committed to development, trials and commercialization of mobile remittance services.

Bharti Airtel Limited, a group company of Bharti Enterprises, is India’s leading integrated telecom services provider with an aggregate of 53 million customers as of end of October 2007, consisting of 50.9 million mobile customers. Bharti Airtel has been rated among the best performing companies in the world in the BusinessWeek IT 100 list 2007
Bharti Airtel is structured into three strategic business units - Mobile services, Telemedia services and Enterprise services.

The mobile business provides mobile & fixed wireless services using GSM technology across 23 telecom circles. The Telemedia business provides broadband & telephone services in 94 cities and is foraying into the IPTV and DTH segments. The Enterprise services provide end-to-end telecom solutions to corporate customers and national & international long distance services to carriers. All these services are provided under the Airtel brand. Airtel’s high-speed optic fibre network currently spans over 55,000 kms covering all the major cities in the country.

The company has two international landing stations in Chennai that connects two submarine cable systems - i2i to Singapore and SEA-ME-WE-4 to Europe.

Western Union, together with its affiliates Orlandi Valuta and Vigo, is a leading provider of global money-transfer services, providing people with fast, reliable and convenient ways to send money around the world, pay bills and purchase money orders through a network of more than 320,000 Agent locations in over 200 countries and territories.