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1998–2008 2008–2010 2010–present
1998–2008 2008–2010 2010–present

Headquartered in Amsterdam, Airtel Africa is a subsidiary of Indian telecommunications multinational Bharti Airtel. It was founded in 2010 after Airtel acquired all of Zain’s African operations, with the exception of Sudan. It operates in fifteen countries in Africa.

Celtel[]

1998–2008[]

Celtel Africa

The Celtel group was founded in 1998 by Sudanese–British businessman Mo Ibrahim. It was sold to the Kuwait-headquartered Mobile Telecommunications Company (MTC) in 2005.

Celtel started the "One Network" in 2006, which allowed users to roam freely in several African countries.

Zain[]

2008–2010[]

Zain

MTC, the parent company of Celtel, rebranded to Zain in September 2007. Accordingly, all Celtel networks in Africa were rebranded to Zain on 1 August 2008.

Airtel[]

2010–present[]

Bharti Airtel Limited logo

Zain sold its entire African business to Indian telecom company Airtel in 2010, with the exception of Sudan. (After South Sudan split from Sudan in 2011, Zain started operating there as well.) All the Zain networks were accordingly rebranded to Airtel on 23 November 2010, with the new corporate logo that had been introduced five days before, on 18 November.

In 2016, Airtel sold its operations in Burkina Faso and Sierra Leone to Orange S.A. In 2017, Airtel Africa merged its Ghanaian business with Tigo to create AirtelTigo.


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