Alphabet Inc’s Google is considering acquiring a stake in Vodafone Group Plc’s struggling Indian business, the Financial Times reported, joining Facebook Inc in investing in the world’s fastest-growing mobile arena.

Google may take a stake of about 5% in Vodafone Idea, a partnership between the UK telecom carrier and the Aditya Birla Group, though the deliberations are at a very early state, the FT cited people familiar with the matter as saying.

Any deal would come weeks after Facebook paid US$5.7bil for a slice of digital assets controlled by Mukesh Ambani, Asia’s richest man. The deal was a landmark investment followed in successive days by major influxes of capital into India’s tech industry led by private equity firms.

Spokespeople from Vodafone and Vodafone Idea declined to comment.

Google itself has big ambitions for India, a country with a huge first-time Internet user population that serves as a test-bed for innovations in smartphone technology.

Facebook’s alliance with Ambani’s Reliance inserted a powerful new competitor into a crowded Indian Internet industry already contested by Google, Walmart Inc, Amazon.com Inc and SoftBank Group Corp-backed local outfit Paytm. But none of them have the reach of WhatsApp, the nation’s most popular communications platform.

 - Bloomberg