Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi is on three days visit to UK and on the first day has got assurance from Vodafone for huge investment in India. Vodafone based in UK has committed investments totalling INR 13,000 crore (£ 1.3 billion) for capacity augmentation and new business initiatives.
Vodafone is one of India’s leading telecommunications service providers and this huge investment was committed to by Mr. Vittorio Colao, Vodafone Group Plc‘s CEO, in his meeting with the Hon’ble Prime Minister Shri Narendra Modi in London.
Vodafone had started operations in India in 2007 and they have already invested over INR 111,000 crore and over INR 100,000cr contributed to the exchequer and is today the largest FDI investor in the country.
Out of Rs. 13,000 crores commited by Vodafone, the company has plans to invest INR 8,000 crore to enhance, upgrade and expand network coverage for Digital India mission of Government of India. INR 3000 crores will be invested to further increase capacity and upgrade its high-end technology centre and IT and customer experience centres in Pune and Ahmedabad. These centres service Vodafone companies globally, exemplifying the “Make in India” opportunity and highlighting its success to the world. INR 1,000 crores will be spent for setting up a state-of-the-art Tier-4 data centre. This is the first of its kind in the Indian telecom sector and is specially designed to service the evolving communications needs of businesses and enterprises. INR 1000 crores will be invested on the payment bank for which Vodafone M-Pesa Ltd. has received an in-principle license from RBI. This will provide further impetus to M-Pesa’s focus on financial inclusion and accelerate India’s journey into a cashless economy.
According to Vodafone, the planned capacity expansions and investments in the high-end technology centre and the customer service centres will create opportunities for employment and for skilling and training India’s rich talent pool. Vodafone will accordingly increase its staffing levels to 15,000 employees over the next two years.
Speaking about the investments in India, Mr. Vittorio Colao, Vodafone Group Plc CEO, said, “At Vodafone, we are enthused with the PM’s vision for ‘Digital India’ and ‘Make in India’. Vodafone India serves over 188 million citizens, of which almost 100 million are from rural areas. As the co-creator of the telecom ecosystem, a catalyst of the telecom revolution in India and being committed for the long term, we are ideally poised to partner the Government of India in fulfilling these important initiatives. We are pleased to announce our enhanced commitment to India through this series of significant further investments.”
