Reliance Jio is a digital service provider devised by parent company Reliance Industries Limited (RIL) in order to serve as a comprehensive digital ecosystem. Reliance Jio’s services were launched in September 2016 across its 22 telecom circles in India. With the help of its wireless broadband services, the service provider aims to fulfill the vision of a fully digital India.
With its spectrum coverage, offers, and wide user base, the telecom operator is ready to bring about a digital revolution that would greatly impact the country.
Spectrum coverage
Reliance Jio is the owner of the largest quantum of spectrum which goes a long way towards helping it service millions of Indians across the country. It owns spectrum across several bands like 800 MHz, 1800 MHz, and 2300 MHz.
User base
Presently, the telecom operator’s 4G services are present in more than 200,000 villages and over 18,000 urban locations. Over the next one year, Jio plans to increase its coverage to 90% of India, in terms of its geographical extent.
Mukesh Ambani, CMD of RIL announced that Jio would be distributing one million Wi-Fi hotspots across India as well as offering students 25% extra in terms of data packages.
Tariff rates
During the announcement of its commercial launch, Reliance Jio stated that national roaming and voice calling would be free for a lifetime for Jio subscribers. Additionally, its data packages are priced at approximately Rs. 50 per GB which is claimed to be the cheapest in the world. Bank of America Merill Lynch is expecting other telecom operators in India to be affected by the low tariff rates offered by Reliance Jio.
Many leading operators had recently slashed their prices in order to retain premium data users, but, some of them may be forced to further reduce prices in order to combat Jio’s schemes.
Entrepreneur funding
Mukesh Ambani announced that Reliance Jio would be setting aside Rs. 5,000 crore in order to fund budding Indian start-ups. The telecom operator aims to facilitate the growth of future businesses through this initiative by creating a platform for young entrepreneurs.
The Reliance Jio Digital India Startup Fund will utilize the Rs. 5,000 crore as venture capital across the next five years in order to support and encourage the youth to build their businesses in India.
Jio applications
Reliance Jio elaborated on Jio’s future plans of creating new opportunities in terms of helpful applications. The service provider intends to introduce mobile applications that focus on various sectors like health, agriculture, education, rural livelihood opportunities, and more. The company believes that digitization should not be restricted to urban areas. In fact, India can only be called truly digitized once the revolution has reached all its remote locations.
Reliance Jio plans to roll out its fiber-to-home wired network services in various Indian cities and its optical fiber network across the country. The company is working with partners in order to create e-commerce and other digital solutions to the problems faced by consumers in the Indian market.
Summary
Reliance Jio, devised to function as a digital ecosystem, is gearing up to bring about a digital revolution in the country.