Sunil Jain has captured the problems with the Bharti-Zain deal in the sense of the higher valuations versus other companies, including Bharti, and the problems of dealing with so many regulators in Africa (“Is Zain a gain or a pain?”, February 22). What Jain does not pay adequate attention to, however, are the long-term implications of the deal. If, using the figure Jain gives in his piece, Bharti is able to replicate its “minute factory” model in Africa — lower tariffs to maximise the traffic on each telecom tower — this will make the deal more attractive than what it looks right now. The markets have a blinkered view and are not able to take this into account.
Sanjeev Sharma, New Delhi
