Positive IUC revenues help Jio avoid eighth straight quarterly ARPU fall

Kolkata: Reliance Jio Infocomm’s average revenue per user (ARPU) would have fallen for the eighth successive quarter during October-December despite two tariff hikes during this period had it not garnered strong termination revenues stemming from a favourable calling traffic pattern, analysts say.

Jio’s December price raise, they said, won’t drive any meaningful ARPU growth for the company till the April-June quarter of FY21, as a bulk of its customers remain on longer-validity plans and haven’t moved to the new tariff packs.

The Mukesh Ambani-led telco reported a 7 per cent sequential growth in ARPU to Rs 128.4 in the December quarter, after seven successive quarters of decline.

ARPU is a key performance metric closely linked to the profitability in a capital-intensive sector like telecom where companies need to invest a lot on infrastructure.