Bharti Airtel International of India today officially announced its acquisition of Nigeria's telecoms giant, Zain Telecom's Africa in a $10.7 billion deal to become the world's fifth largest mobile operator with 180 million subscribers in 18 Asian and African nations.

Announcing completion of the deal, Bharti Group Chairman Sunil Mittal said, "The transaction is the largest ever cross-border deal in an emerging market and will result in combined revenues of about $13 billion.

Bharti has acquired Zain Telecom's operations in 15 African nations, excluding Sudan and Morocco. Zain has operations in 17 countries in the region and is claiming to be the second largest operator after MTN.

"Officials of the company told journalist in Lagos that the brand will be fully launched in all the 15 nations during the Nigeria's 50th independence anniversary in October this year.

Zain Africa will now be 100 per cent subsidiary of Bharti International, he said, adding that this deal will signal many new investments that will go to Africa.

Mr. Manoj Kholi, Bharti Group Chief Executive Officer for Africa said the company will invest $600 million in Nigeria in the next 3 years, an investment that will see it become the world's 3rd largest network.

Elaborating on Africa strategy, Manoj Kholi, looking after Bharti's international operations, said that the company has set a target of 100 million subscribers and USD five billion revenue by 2012-13.

Asked whether he regretted missing a deal with MTN twice and whether that was his first choice, Mittal said, "...MTN was the first opportunity that was available at that time. In MTN's case, we would have had Board control but no management control and no change in brand.

"There were compromises to be made (in MTN). Zain is the second largest operator and that is the only difference. But we will have full control and our own brand. We are fortunate that we got the second chance (Zain) and got much better deal," Mittal said.

"With this, we will have an unparallelled footprint in one of the fastest developing regions in the world. We are looking at more opportunities as we build more roll outs in Africa," Mittal said.

The company has also reached a settlement with Broad Communications, the single largest shareholder in Zain Nigeria, following which its chief Otudeko would now head Bharti's operations in Nigeria.

"There is no extra payment made for the settlement," Mittal said, adding that the company does not see any problem with another small shareholder Econet Wireless in Nigeria.

For completing the deal, Bharti paid $7.9 billion and the balance of $400 million from the total upfront payment would be done in a few days on completion of certain formalities, Mittal said. The remaining $700 million would be paid after a year. Bharti has also taken over $1.7 billion of Zain's debts as on December 31, 2009, he said.

Commenting on the debt position, the company said it has raised loans at an extremely competitive rate of interest and would have no problem in meeting its future investment plans.