The statement added, “he has demonstrated great maturity in dealing with all stakeholders and provided robust leadership to the team in Uganda.”
It is not clear why Somasekhar chose to leave especially when things were starting to look up for the entity, posting profits and having its subscriber numbers growing. Somasekhar re-joined Airtel Africa in August 2017, after an earlier stint in Uganda between 2010 and 2014.
Under his watch, Somasekhar oversaw a transformation of Airtel from loss-making to a profitable entity overtaking market leader MTN Uganda. Airtel Uganda is the only profitable unit of Bharti Airtel in East Africa.
Bharti Airtel Africa report for 2018 shows Kenya, Tanzania and Rwanda are making losses while in Uganda, Airtel saw its profits grow by almost 30 per cent from $65.6m in 2017 to $90.5m in 2018.
He is the one who sketched the buying of Warid Uganda which pushed the telecommunication company’s subscriber number numbers almost at par with MTN, which remains the leader.
He leaves when MTN Uganda and Airtel Uganda, the biggest players in Uganda, are competing favourably.