Click to play videoNew Delhi: Vodafone is paying a lot of money to enter the Indian market. $19.3 billion is the price the British telecom major is paying to enter the world's fastest growing mobile phone market.
Vodafone emerged as the top bidder for majority stake in India's fourth largest mobile player Hutch-Essar, leaving behind Anil Ambani Group's Reliance Communications, a consortium led by Hindujas, and Hutch's partner Essar.
The fate of suitors, who submitted their bids on Friday, was decided at a meeting of the board of Hutchison Telecom, which had put its 67 per cent stake on the block a few months ago.
Other foreign players like Russia's Altima and Egypt's Orasscom too had expressed their interest in buying Hutch.
So what’s all the buzz about?
Studies say that in terms of user base, India is going to be the second largest mobile phone market in the world by 2008.
That means India will overtake both the US and Russia and will be just behind China.
For Arun Sarin, the Indian-born, IIT-educated head of Vodafone, this may be just the homecoming he had hoped for.
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