Airtel plans listing of payments arm

Bharti Airtel will look at listing its fintech arm, Airtel Payments Bank (APB) as part of its strategy to monetise its digital service offerings, a company executive in the know of developments told FE. However, the exact timing hasn’t been finalised yet, he added.

Though Airtel has several other digital businesses relating to advertising, cybersecurity, cloud for small and medium enterprises, and communication platforms as a service (CpaaS), the executive said that these cannot be monetised on the lines of the payments bank because they are intertwined with the mobility business.

According to him, the only other digital business, after the payments, which can be monetised is the data centres but that would take years.