Bharti Airtel partners with IBM to expand cloud services in India

NEW DELHI - Bharti Airtel announced on Wednesday a strategic partnership with IBM (NYSE:IBM), a prominent player in the IT Services industry with a market capitalization of $257 billion, to enhance its recently launched Airtel Cloud platform, expanding its availability zones in India from four to ten. According to InvestingPro data, IBM’s strong financial health score of "GOOD" and impressive YTD return of 28% reflect its robust market position.

The collaboration aims to combine Airtel’s telecommunications infrastructure with IBM’s cloud solutions and AI technologies, targeting enterprises in regulated industries such as banking, healthcare, and government sectors. With annual revenue exceeding $64 billion, IBM brings substantial resources to this partnership. For deeper insights into IBM’s financial metrics and growth potential, InvestingPro subscribers have access to over 30 additional exclusive tips and comprehensive valuation analysis.

Under the partnership, Airtel Cloud customers will gain access to IBM Power systems as a service, including the latest IBM Power11 servers designed for AI workloads and mission-critical applications. The offering will support enterprise workloads including IBM Power AIX, IBM i, Linux, and SAP Cloud ERP.

"Airtel Cloud is designed to be highly secure and compliant, setting new industry benchmarks as an agile and resilient cloud platform," said Gopal Vittal, Vice Chairman & Managing Director of Bharti Airtel. "With the IBM partnership, we are adding substantial capabilities to address the unique needs of several industries."

The companies plan to establish two new Multizone Regions in Mumbai and Chennai, which will help Indian enterprises strengthen their resilience and address data residency requirements.

Rob Thomas, SVP and Chief Commercial Officer at IBM, said, "Through our partnership with Bharti Airtel, clients across India can leverage IBM’s innovative cloud offerings designed for workloads that address their strategic business priorities."

The partnership will also provide customers with access to IBM’s software stack for AI inferencing, built on IBM watsonx and Red Hat OpenShift AI, allowing clients to run AI inference across hybrid cloud environments.

Airtel, one of India’s leading telecommunications providers with over 600 million customers across 15 countries, announced the partnership in a press release statement. IBM’s stock is currently trading near its 52-week high of $301.04, though InvestingPro analysis suggests the stock may be slightly overvalued at current levels. Discover comprehensive insights about IBM and 1,400+ other stocks through InvestingPro’s detailed research reports.

In other recent news, IBM announced the acquisition of Cognitus, a Dallas-based SAP services provider, to bolster its capabilities in regulated industries such as Aerospace and Defense, Energy and Utilities, and Manufacturing. Additionally, IBM has entered into a strategic partnership with S&P Global to integrate its watsonx Orchestrate AI framework into S&P Global’s supply chain management solutions, enhancing visibility and vendor selection tools. IBM is also set to release its Spyre Accelerator for AI workloads on enterprise systems, with availability starting on October 28 for IBM z17 and LinuxONE 5 systems, and later for Power11 servers. The Spyre Accelerator is designed to support AI applications while ensuring security and resilience.

Furthermore, IBM unveiled new AI productivity tools at its TechXchange 2025 event, introducing enhancements to its watsonx Orchestrate framework, including AgentOps for real-time monitoring and agentic workflows. In another strategic move, IBM partnered with Anthropic to integrate the Claude large language model into select software products, aiming to improve productivity in enterprise software development. IBM’s internal testing with over 6,000 early adopters reported productivity gains of 45 percent while maintaining code quality and security standards. These developments highlight IBM’s ongoing efforts to expand its AI and enterprise software capabilities.

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