Reliance Jio to roll-out wired broadband service ‘JioGigaFiber’ from 15 Aug

After disrupting the telecom sector, Mukesh Ambani’s Reliance Jio is all set to disrupt the wired broadband market with the launch of fibre-to-the-home (FTTH) broadband service ‘JioGigaFiber’.

Addressing the Reliance Industries Ltd (RIL) AGM, the company’s chairman Mukesh Ambani revealed that the broadband service will roll-out from 15 August across 1,100 cities simultaneously.

The service will provide 1.1 terabytes (TB) of free data at 100 Mbps speed. JioGigaFiber will have its own special router called JioGigaRouter besides a set top box (STB) JioGigaTV that will allow customers to place voice calls, and allow for media sharing as well.

Ambani said that the ‘JioGigaFiber’ service will offer ultra-high definition (UHD) entertainment on large screen TVs. It will also allow multi-party video conferencing, voice-activated virtual assistants, virtual reality gaming and digital shopping.

The service will also allow subscribers to control devices like security cameras, home appliances, lights and switches using a smartphone from both inside and outside the home.

Ambani also said that the broadband service will allow large enterprises to compete in the global marketplace using digital tools and techniques. For merchants and small businesses, the fixed-line broadband will empower them to compete on level terms with larger businesses.

Jio, Ambani said, is determined to move India to among the top 5 in fixed-line broadband. He further added that Optical Fiber-based fixed-line broadband is the future. Fixed-line broadband offers hundreds to megabits, even gigabits per second of data speeds.

“While India has pole-vaulted into global leadership in the mobile broadband space we still lag behind significantly in fixed-line broadband. India is ranked quite low at 134th in the global ranking for fixed broadband, poor fixed-line infrastructure has been a key reason for this,” Ambani said.

“In countries with better developed communication infrastructure, more than 80% of data consumption happens Indoors through fixed-line connectivity in homes, in offices and other premises.”

Jio has already invested over Rs 250,000 crore for creating the state-of-the-art digital infrastructure to provide mobile and broadband connectivity across the country, with the largest fiber footprint, Ambani noted.

Ambani also unveiled the JioPhone ‘Monsoon Hungama’ offer. Starting 21 July, consumers can exchange their existing feature phone for a brand new JioPhone for Rs 501. “We have thus reduced the effective entry cost of the JioPhone from Rs 1500 to as low as Rs 501,” Ambani said.

He also introduced another attractive offer to feature phone users. The three most popular apps YouTube, WhatsApp and Facebook will be available to all the JioPhone users from 15th August, he said.

The company’s JioPhone2 will be available at an introductory price of only Rs 2999 starting 15th August.

“With the added functionalities, our wider network reach across India and strong retail presence across India, the goal that I have now set for our Jio team is to enable 100 million users on this JioPhone platform in the shortest possible time,” he stated.

JioPhone has been availed by more than 25 million users in India.

Talking about Reliance Jio, Ambani said that the telecom operator has doubled its customer base to over 215 million. This is a record that no technology company has been able to achieve anywhere in the world, he added.

Jio’s data usage has grown from 125 crore GBs per month to more than 240 crore GBs per month. Voice usage on the network has grown from 250 crore minutes per day to more than 530 crore minutes per day.

The amount of video consumption has grown from 165 crore hours per month to more than 340 crore hours per month. Jio customers are actively engaged for more than 290 minutes per day on an average.

Talking about the media and entertainment business, Ambani said that one in every two Indians consume Network18’s content while one in every five internet users in India is on Network18 websites or apps.

“We have the largest portfolio of TV Channels in India – 69 Channels across News and Entertainment. We have India’s largest TV News Platform in News18 that is multilingual providing independent and reliable news. We also have India’s largest entertainment platform which spans all major regional languages. We are consistently ranked amongst the top players in each of our segments,” Ambani noted.

He also said that Network18 is the partner of choice for leading global brands like CNBC, CNN, Forbes, History, MTV, and Nickelodeon.

Regional content and digital delivery continue to be the focus of Network18, which will drive its future growth, Ambani said.

“The media and entertainment platform with a viewership in excess of 700 million enables us to achieve a very special societal purpose: Our purpose is two-fold: to provide wholesome entertainment and to enrich the power of Ideas that can make India a great nation,” he stated.