New Delhi, Jan 11 (IANS): Telecom major Bharti Airtel on Monday announced its partnership with National Small Industries Corporation (NSIC) to accelerate the digital transformation of Micro, Small and Medium Enterprises (MSMEs) in India.

NSIC is a Government of India Enterprise having its mission "to promote and support MSME sector by providing integrated support services encompassing marketing, technology, finance and other services".

This partnership with NSIC envisages digital transformation of this critical sector as key to the Central government's vision of 'Aatmanirbhar Bharat' for enabling MSMEs to scale up faster by ways of adopting digital ways of doing business.

"We are delighted to join hands with NSIC to fast-track their digital transformation journey. Airtel's pan-India network, deep distribution reach as well as easily accessible digital platforms would give MSMEs the flexibility and convenience of addressing all their digital connectivity requirements through a single window," said Ajay Chitkara, Director and CEO, Airtel Business.

The offerings would come with the trusted support from Airtel that ensures high customer satisfaction through industry leading service uptime. Airtel already serves more than one million medium and small businesses across India with best-in-class products that are available to customers in highly flexible formats.

"This partnership with Airtel is envisaged to serve multiple ICT needs of MSME sector for sustained growth and increased productivity," said P. Udayakumar, Director (Planning and Marketing), NSIC.

MSMEs are an important growth engine of the Indian economy. With more than 60 million business units, the sector contributes to 29 per cent of India's GDP, 40 per cent of exports and employs more than 110 million people.

These businesses are looking for reliable, secure connectivity and digital platforms that would add to their efficiency and competitiveness, the company said.