Reliance Jio Becomes First Telecom Operator In India To Have Over 40 Cr Subscribers

Reliance Jio retained its top slot with a market share of 35.03% in July according to the Telecom Regulatory Authority of India’s (TRAI) monthly report. The Mukesh Ambani owned telco added over 35 lakh more wireless subscribers to its mobile network compared to June. 

Vi, which was rebranded from the erstwhile Vodafone-Idea, lost 37 lakh subscribers, to retain its third slot with a market share of 26.34%. 

This makes Reliance Jio the first mobile services provider to cross the 40 Cr customer mark in India.

Meanwhile, Bharti Airtel retained its second spot with a market share of 27.96%. The total wireless subscriber also saw an uptick of 114 Cr at the end of June to 114.4 Cr at the end of July. Broadband connections, dominated by the mobile segment, grew by 1.03% to 70.54 Cr  in July from INR 69.82 Cr in June.

In recent times, Reliance Jio has been on a spree raising funds. Its last infusion was $4.5 Bn from global tech giant Google for 7.73% equity stake, Mukesh Ambani announced at Reliance’s 43rd Annual General Meeting (AGM). Google is investing at an equity valuation of INR 4.36 Lakh Cr.

This was the 13th investment for Reliance Jio in the past three months. Qualcomm is investing in Jio Platforms at an equity value of INR 4.91 Lakh Cr and an enterprise value of INR 5.16 Lakh Cr. The investment gives Qualcomm 0.15% stake in Reliance Jio on a fully diluted basis. In its statement, Reliance said the deal would help accelerate the rollout of the 5G networks in India. Qualcomm is one of the few smartphone chipset makers which produces mobile chipsets with integrated 5G modems. Most leading smartphones in India are backed by Qualcomm chipsets.

Strengthening Its 5G Play

With this latest investment from Google, Jio Platform has raised a total of INR 152,056 Cr (nearly $20 Bn) from leading investors, including Facebook, Silver Lake, General Atlantic, KKR, TPG Capital, Abu Dhabi Investment Authority (ADIA), Mubadala Investment Company, Saudi Arabia’s Public Investment Fund, L Catterton, Vista Equity Partner and Intel Capital since April 22.  

At the Reliance AGM, the company announced that it had developed a ‘Made in India’ solution for 5G network connectivity, which it would look to export to other countries after testing and scaling it in India. 

A few days after the AGM, the company reached out to the Department of Telecommunications (DoT) for the 5G spectrum, despite there being no official announcement for a 5G spectrum auction by the Telecom Regulatory Authority Of India (TRAI).

Last month, Reliance Jio had also launched in-flight call, SMS, data services for its postpaid users travelling abroad, in partnership with UK-based connectivity provider AeroMobile. Jio is the first Indian operator to launch on-board mobile connectivity.