Bahrain Telecommunications (Batelco) has become the latest international operator to enter the Indian market. The operator is to buy a 49 percent stake in small Indian mobile operator S Tel for US$225 million in collaboration with the Dubai-based Millennium Private Equity fund. S Tel operates in Northern India, where it has GSM licenses to offer services in six states serving a total population of around 230 million. “Our priority now is to assist S Tel to rapidly roll-out network infrastructure and offer mobile services to customers,” Batelco chief executive Peter Kaliaropoulos said in a statement.

The deal is the latest in a series of investments in Indian mobile firms by foreign operators recently, including Norway’s Telenor (via a 60 percent stake in India’s Unitech Wireless), Japan’s NTT DoCoMo (26 percent stake in Tata Teleservices), and UAE’s Etisalat (45 percent stake in Swan Telecom). According to a Reuters report, Middle Eastern operators are particularly well placed to make such deals in the current climate as they typically have low levels of debt. Batelco, the former monopoly operator in Bahrain, said it expected to complete the S Tel deal during the current quarter.