JioPhone Next found limited takers despite discounting: IIFL

Reliance Jio’s bundled handsets under the JioPhone Next brand have found limited takers despite heavy discounting, brokerage IIFL said in its report.

Additionally, the handsets sold under the JioPhone brand, launched a few years back, have not been returned by the customers, despite the full refund offer that they came with, it added.

“Retailers in the larger towns we visited stocked JioPhone Next; but cited sales being poor despite a 25% price cut from the original listed price of Rs6,499,” IIFL said in its report.

JioPhone Next is the bundled 4G smartphone offering from the telco. It is now listed at Rs 4,499 on Jio’s website as well. Apart from voice and data, the phone also came with bundled entertainment services.

Both the JioPhone Next, and the earlier model JioPhone , are finding fewer takers in the market according to IIFL.

JioPhone, launched in 2017, is a 4G enabled feature phone.

“While JIOPhone sales were robust in 2018 and 2019; sales are down to a trickle now. Some retailers stated that since JIO now sells JIO Phone at Rs 3,000 to the retailer, end-user pricing is much higher than 2G handsets making affordability a challenge,” analysts from IIFL noted.

In addition to the cost compared to 2G handsets, issues with damaged handsets have also impacted JioPhone sales, IIFL analysts observed.

Jio had launched the JioPhone handsets which offered bundled connectivity over the Jio network. The initial purchase cost Rs 1500 which was labelled security deposit.

The customer was required to avail charged services of the telco for 300 days every year for three years, including recharges. Having done this, the customer could return the phone after the three-year period and get a refund on the initial purchase of the phone.

“However, all retailers we surveyed said that customers have not returned the handset after 3 years. We also found that JIO was selling batteries for the JIOPhone handset to cater to the replacement demand of existing JIOPhone users,” IIFL added.