View: Only time will tell if Jio-Facebook deal is beneficial for India

With its Rs 43,574 crore investment, Facebook is now Reliance Jio’s largest minority shareholder. This was accompanied by a pact between WhatsApp and Reliance Retail to boost the latter’s JioMart platform. InJuly 2019, Facebook invested in Meesho, an Indian social commerce company that connects buyers and sellers on social media. Similarly, the plan with JioMart focuses on connecting kirana stores to customers.

This investment gets Jio easier access to hundreds of millions of users across WhatsApp, Facebook and Instagram, financial and technological muscle, and a better balance sheet.

For Facebook, it means access to over 370 million Jio subscribers, a partnership with one of India’s largest tech companies with a play in telecom services and infrastructure, cloud storage (JioCloud), digital entertainment (JioTV and Jio