Bharti Airtel has forayed into the mobile handset business, as group firm Beetel launched eight handsets in the price range of Rs 1,750-7,000. In a statement, Vinod Sawhny, executive director and CEO, Beetel Teletech said, "The market is huge and there is a room for Indian players. Phones in the price range of Rs 2,000-6,000 are witnessing 30 per cent growth and we plan to offer a good combination of feature-rich phones at affordable prices. It was important for a group company Beetel to enter the market with a product for masses that is different from others."

Initially, Beetel will have an in-house design facility in India and operating on a business model under which manufacturing is being done outside India, but with innovation done locally. The entire range of Beetel handhelds has features like dual SIMs, FM and cameras, along with a bouquet of value added services, ranging from social networking applications (Facebook and Nimbuzz) to partnering with mobile commerce partner (NgPay), mobile portal (Yahoo), internet browser (Opera Mini), added with offers of free call and free SMSes powered by Ibibo. This exclusive tie-up will give Beetel customers an opportunity to make free calls and short messaging services (SMS) through GPRS technology enabled on the phones.

The company plans to establish its presence across India by the end of the current fiscal. In the first phase of the launch, Beetel mobile phones will be available through a nationwide distribution network of over 4,000 outlets across Delhi, Haryana, Uttar Pradesh and Uttaranchal, Rajasthan, Punjab and the seven northeastern states. In addition, Beetel phones will be supported by an extensive service network of 400 service centres, backed by an SMS facility for locating the service centres across six states.