In a giant leap forward for India's booming BPO industry, cellular major Airtel Monday announced the outsourcing of its call centre operations to four global majors in a Rs.10 billion ($230 million) deal spread over five years.

"In real terms, what this means is that Indian customers will, for the first time, benefit from cutting edge technology services being provided to international customers," Airtel President (Mobility) Manoj Kohli said while announcing the tie-up with IBM-Daksh, Mphasis, Hinduja TMT and TeleTech Services.

Between them, the four companies will establish 6,000 call centre seats in the national capital region, Chandigarh, Kolkatta, Pune, Hyderabad and Chennai to service Airtel's 12.5 million customers in 23 circles across the country. Airtel's existing 1,500 call centre employees will shift to servicing its high-end customers once the new arrangement is in place in two-three months.

The arrangement is initially for a five- year period "but is likely to continue in perpetuity as we grow and the Indian cellular industry grows," Kohli said.

"It's not just the quality of service. For the time, Airtel customers will have access to a standardised and consistent level of customer service regardless of which circle they are in," Kohli added.

"The partnership will significantly enhance the service delivery experience and also provide access to the latest in customer service technology," pointed out Mphasis President Bhaskar Menon.

The new arrangement, Kohli said, would enable Airtel "channelise its resources and expertise to its core areas of product innovation, value added services, marketing, brand building and customer delight innovations, while simultaneously providing world-class mobile services".

Airtel also announced a landmark technology outsourcing arrangement with global major Nortel for providing multilingual voice recognition and other technology for the new call centres.

"Nortel brings to Bharati a world-class contact centre technology platform that will provide flexibility and high quality. Our partners bring in superior technology and robust processes, providing a uniform contact experience and built in scalability in line with our expansion and growth plans," said Airtel parent Bharati Tele-Ventures joint managing director Akhil Gupta.

"Customers will be able to interact in English, Hindi and four other regional languages (that have yet to be identified)," said Nortel India managing director Ashoka Walia.

Airtel currently has a 22 percent share of India's 57.3 million cellular subscribers. Industry estimates say the market can grow to 250 million subscribers by 2010.