Jio Infocomm’s head of strategy and planning Anshuman Thakur told media that the company is ready to start offering its 4G services, except for in four circles—Rajasthan, Karnataka, Tamil Nadu and Kerala—where it could take four to six more weeks to prepare the network, indicating that the commercial launch around the corner. Jio has received approvals from the telecom department on July 7 in the four circles of Rajasthan, Karnataka, Tamil Nadu and Kerala, according to Thakur.
"We had thought that we would launch once our 850 MHz network was integrated, because we don't want to be working on the network after the launch. But apart from that, our overall readiness is really high," Thakur was quoted as saying to Economic Times.
Reliance Jio Friday said that it now has over 1.5 million test users on its network in the country. The telecom operator, which is currently offering services under a test program, revealed that the average monthly consumption per user has reached in excess of 26 GB. It also said that the average voice usage per month is over 355 minutes.
According to media repots, Jio has invested around Rs 1.34 lakh crore of the Rs 1.5 lakh crore for setting up its network, on spectrum and other expenses. The 4G entrant will spend the rest to expand coverage to 90% of the population over two years from the date of the launch from the 70% it has already achieved.
“Capital expenditure for this fiscal year through March 2017 stands at $3-4 billion..Jio debt stands at Rs 42,000-43,000 crore. This is mostly rupee-denominated since the business is domestic,” Thakur was quoted as saying.
Reliance Jio currently has total liberalised spectrum holdings of 846.10 MHz in the 4G bands of 2300 MHz, 1800 Mhz and 850 MHz. The telco had entered into agreement with RCOM for sharing of spectrum in the 800 MHz band across 21 circles.
