Jio Infocomm: Year 1 and in profit
April 30, 2018
By Chris Forrester
Jio Infocomm, a start-up cellular telco in India, is still adding some 26 million new subscribers each quarter since launching 18 months ago. It now reaches a total of 186.6 million.
The business, a subsidiary of Mukesh Ambani’s Reliance Industries, was launched to the public in September 2016 and was an instant success. Jio’s core offering is a Voice (and data) over LTE and 4G, and topped 50 million users just 83 days later. Jio’s bundling of services includes ‘free’ WiFi, live video, instant messaging and online payments.
Ambani, commenting on the company’s results for 2017, said that ARPU was Rupees 137 a month (about $2.06) and churn was an acceptable 0.25 per cent per month. Revenues were up 30.5 per cent on 2016, and that Jio was now the world’s largest data network.