Benzinga | Jan 28, 2022 02:39AM EST

Google Vs. Facebook: Tech Giants Back Rival Mobile Phone Operators In India

Alphabet Inc (NASDAQ:GOOG) (NASDAQ:GOOGL)-owned Google will invest up to $1 billion in India's second largest telecom operator Bharti Airtel, two years after Mark Zuckerberg-led Facebook's -- now renamed as Meta Platforms Inc's (NASDAQ:FB) -- mega funding in Reliance Jio Platforms.

What Happened: The deal involves Google investing $700 million to buy a 1.28% stake in Airtel at a price of about $9.9 a share and also pump in up to $300 million toward potential multi-year commercial agreements, Airtel said in a regulatory filing on Friday.

The New Delhi-based Airtel said the deal will help boost its 5G plans across smartphones of all price ranges.

It would also push the cloud ecosystem for businesses across India.

"As a part of its first commercial agreement, Airtel and Google will work together to build on Airtel's extensive offerings that covers a range of Android-enabled devices to consumers via innovative affordability programs," Airtel said.

The deal, it said, is also aimed at lowering the "barriers of owning a smartphone across a range of price points, in partnership with various device manufacturers."

Google CEO Sundar Pichai had in 2020 said the company would invest about $10 billion for the India Digitization Fund over the next five to seven years.

See Also: Facebook Invests $5.7B In One Of India's Largest Internet Services Companies

Why It Matters: The investment is the latest instance of growing interest in India's 1.8 billion mobile users from U.S.-based tech giants.

Google and Meta products -- Google search, Youtube, Facebook, Instagram, WhatsApp --are immensely popular in India where operators are running 5G trials ahead of the expected commercial deployment this year.

Meta Platforms had in 2020 invested $5.7 billion in Reliance's Jio Platforms, the largest privately-held telecom company owned by billionaire Mukesh Ambani's listed company Reliance Industries.

Price Action: Alphabet Class A shares closed 0.2% lower at $2,580.10 a share on Thursday.