{"id":44907,"date":"2013-08-28T15:26:26","date_gmt":"2013-08-28T13:26:26","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/?p=44907"},"modified":"2013-08-29T09:41:29","modified_gmt":"2013-08-29T07:41:29","slug":"former-mtn-exec-takes-reins-at-bharti-africa","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/mobile\/44907\/former-mtn-exec-takes-reins-at-bharti-africa\/","title":{"rendered":"Former MTN exec takes reins at Bharti Africa"},"content":{"rendered":"

India based telecoms operator Bharti Airtel<\/a> has\u00a0appointed former MTN Group<\/a> executive, Christian De Faria<\/a> as CEO of its African operations.<\/p>\n

According to the Business Standard and multiple publications in India, De Faria will step into his new post\u00a0from January 1, 2014.<\/p>\n

He will however, join Airtel Africa on September 16, 2013, taking charge of Airtel\u2019s Anglophone operations. Faria will be based in Nairobi and will report to\u00a0Manoj Kohli<\/a>, current MD & CEO (International), in-charge of Bharti Airtel\u2019s operations in Africa, Bangladesh and Sri Lanka.<\/p>\n

De Faria joined MTN in June 2006, as VP for West and Central Africa. He then served as group chief commercial officer at MTN Group until his resignation in January 2013.<\/p>\n

He is currently an independent advisor at Consult Com in the United Arab Emirates.<\/p>\n

“As CEO [for] Airtel Africa, Faria will be based out of Nairobi and lead the growth agenda across markets and build key skills and capabilities within the organization,” a Bharti statement said.<\/p>\n

“We have built a strong foundation for the next phase of growth of our Africa operations and are excited about the opportunities that lie ahead,” Sunil Bharti Mittal, chairman, Bharti Airtel, said.<\/p>\n

Bloomberg noted on Wednesday (28 August) that\u00a0Bharti Airtel, which started operating in Africa in 2010, made a net loss of $106 million on the continent in the three months through June 2013, from a prior loss of $124 million in 2012.<\/p>\n

Sales declined for the second consecutive quarter. Airtel is planning to reverse the trend by targeting a growing number of smartphone users in Africa to boost revenue per user and reduce dependence on traditional fixed-line services.<\/p>\n

Bharti Airtel is India’s largest\u00a0mobile operator with more than 269 million customers including 17 territories in Africa.<\/p>\n

More on MTN<\/h3>\n

Alcatel wades into MTN debacle<\/strong><\/a><\/p>\n

Another day, another MTN scandal<\/strong><\/a><\/p>\n

\u00a0MTN suspends another executive<\/strong><\/a><\/p>\n

MTN CEO warns \u201cdestructive\u201d rivals<\/strong><\/a><\/p>\n

Why MTN CFO Nazir Patel resigned<\/strong><\/a><\/p>\n

MTN reshuffles leadership in key markets<\/a><\/strong><\/p>\n

MTN moves to assure investors over CFO<\/a><\/strong><\/p>\n

MTN slides on CFO resignation<\/a><\/strong><\/p>\n

MTN executive resigns amid controversy<\/a><\/strong><\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

India based telecoms operator Bharti Airtel has appointed former MTN Group executive, Christian De Faria as CEO of its Africa operations.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":10,"featured_media":44908,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[34],"tags":[1660,2135,26,28],"class_list":["post-44907","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-mobile","tag-bharti-airtel","tag-christian-de-faria","tag-headline","tag-mtn"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/44907","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/10"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=44907"}],"version-history":[{"count":5,"href":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/44907\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":44947,"href":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/44907\/revisions\/44947"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/44908"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=44907"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=44907"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=44907"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}