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1 September 2016
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Mukesh Ambani (The Total Investment & Insurance
Solutions)
Taking the current tariff war and
competition in India's telecom space to a new level, Reliance Industries
Chairman Mukesh Ambani on Thursday announced that domestic voice calls on the
Jio network will be free forever, and unveiled a four-month introductory offer
for everyone of free voice and data services beginning on September 5.
"The era of paying for voice
calls is ending," Ambani told the 39th Annual General Meeting of the
company, post its listing. "No Jio customer will ever have to pay for
voice calls again." he added, devoting around an hour of his 90 minute
speech to Jio.
In effect, the announcements on
Thursday point to a commercial launch from January 1 next year even though no
specific mention was made in this regard. This was also keenly awaited since
Reliance Industries has invested as much as $21 billion on Jio -- its largest
ever capital expenditure on a single project. The Total Investment
& Insurance Solutions
The Chairman said the data plans
will also reflect the affordability for customers, with an effective base rate
of 5 paise per MB or Rs 50 per GB. "Jio will have a base rate which is
more than 90 per cent discount over the industry," he said.
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| Reliance Jio (The Total Investment & Insurance Solutions) |
He said based on the usage, the
tariff could go to as low as Rs 25 per GB. He said the free domestic voice
calls will also come with free roaming while international ones too will be
affordable.
The Total Investment & Insurance Solutions
"We Indians have come to
appreciate and applaud Gandhigiri. Now, we can all do 'Data-giri', which is an
opportunity for every Indian to do unlimited good things with unlimited
data."
The announcements came against the
backdrop of a series of discounts and freebies offered by existing layers like
Airtel, Vodafone and Idea during the past month, ostensibly to ensure customers
stay with them, even after the commercial launch of Jio.
During the speech, Mukesh Ambani
also appealed to incumbent operators not to block Jio calls and ensure adequate
points of interconnect. "In the last week alone, Jio customers suffered
over five crore call failures to other networks because of insufficient
interconnect capacity provided by incumbents." The Total Investment
& Insurance Solutions
As for the stock markets, the shares
of Reliance Industries fluctuated in a wide range during the course of the
speech -- from a high of Rs 1,072.55 to a low of Rs 1,045.60. Soon after it was
quoting at Rs 1,047.50, down Rs 10.50, or 0.99 per cent, over the previous
close.
In contrast, Bharti Airtl shares
fell 6.21 per cent at Rs 311.25, while Idea Cellular was quoting at Rs 85.90,
down Rs 7.60 or 8.13 per cent. The Total Investment & Insurance
Solutions
Other highlights of Mukesh Ambani's
speech:
- Students will be able to get 25
per cent more data on Jio's main tariffs
- A target of 100 million customers
in the near future
- Data usage of 250 core GB a month
- The Jio bouquet of apps free will
end next calendar year
- Coverage of Jio to extnd to 90 per
cent of population by March 2017
- A range of 4G enabled smart
devices
- Jio digital Fund of Rs 5,000 crore
to incubate start-ups.The Total Investment & Insurance Solutions
