Bharti Airtel entered into a partnership with networking major Cisco and Servion to ofray into hosted contact centre services.

The services will be offered on pay-per-use mode to clients and do not require any purchase of software licenses, hardware or building IT infrastructure.

"There is a great potential for call centre solutions over a hosted platform, as it promises huge benefits for enterprises across different verticals," Bharti Airtel CEO Enterprise Services Milan Rao said.

The hosted contact centre services market in India is valued at $50 million and the consortium targets to acquire 5,000 users in the first year, said Bharti.

"The consortium combines the reach and brand of Bharti Airtel communication network, technology leadership of Cisco, and domain expertise and integration capabilities of Servion," Servion Global Solutions Managing Director and CEO K Balakrishnan said.

"The tough economic climate has brought about the need for innovative solutions and consumption models and the hosted contact centre model is a great example of one," Cisco India and SAARC Head - Managed Services Vikram Sharma said.