Reliance Communications (RCom), Tata Teleservices (TTSL) and Aircel have struck a tri-partite agreement to provide 3G roaming services to each other’s customers, according to an Economic Times report.

The agreement enables each network operator to expand its 3G reach. RCom gets access to new service areas or ‘circles’ – Andhra Pradesh, Karnataka, Tamil Nadu, Kerala and UP East – courtesy of Aircel’s network. Aircel and TTSL, meanwhile, get access to the more lucrative circles of Delhi and Mumbai where RCom has licences.

“These alliances will further consolidate RCom’s position as the leading data operator in the country and will help the company improve its post-paid and corporate customer market share,” said RCom’s CEO for consumer business, Gurdeep Singh, in a statement quoted by the Economic Times.

For the quarter ended 31 December 2013, RCom – the fourth-largest operator in India – reported that the number of its data customers increased by 31.2 per cent, to 36.2 million, compared with the end of 2012. The data subscriber tally includes 11 million 3G subscribers.

In terms of 3G connections, according to figures from GSMA Intelligence, RCom had around 16 million at the end of March – second only to BSNL in India, which had 19.6 million.

TTSL had 14.4 million 3G connections as of 31 March 2014, while Aircel had 1.9 million.