Reliance Jio introduced GigaFiber to the public only a few weeks ago. This new fibre-based high-speed internet service is going to be the first of its kind offering by the Mukesh Ambani led telco. As we reported earlier, Reliance Jio has also listed out the preview offerings for its new broadband service, and we can’t help but feel nostalgia over this announcement. The telco has announced that it would be offering the service at very aggressive pricing initially like it was the case with Reliance Jio’s 4G services rollout two years back.
Repeating History With Jio GigaFiber
Notably, Reliance Jio recently released the second quarter reports and we can’t disagree on the fact that the company has been performing exceedingly well. With so many telcos making losses and taking a hit, Reliance Jio has only been on the path of progress. The telco in the Q2 FY19 made a profit of Rs 681 crores denoting a rise of 11.3% sequentially. Since Reliance Jio has already tested its strategy once, it makes sense that the telco is going to stick with it for the launch of its new product as well.
Anshuman Thakur, Reliance Jio’s head of Strategy and Planning also commented on the Q2 reports, “From our point of view, the tariff needs to make sense for the customer. The customer needs to see value in what they are paying, and we will make sure they see value in it. I will not comment on the prevalent tariffs as most customers do not have a choice today as they are subscribing to services because there is a service provider that they need and an alternative is just to not have that service.”
Joint Chief Financial Officer at Reliance Industries Limited, V. Srikanth also said, “I think the right tariff to compare is to look at tariff with regard to the high-speed internet, getting the cable through the dish or otherwise and a landline. When you look at tariff, all these three come into play for relevant tariff comparison. Because the opportunities for fibre to home addresses all these in a single shot.”
Reliance Jio is already on the path of raking in customers for its latest broadband service, Jio GigaFiber. With the numbers of interested customers increasing every day, the company has also even initiated the process of meeting higher demands.
Jio to Ramp Up Network Capacity
Further Reliance Jio seems to be having audacious plans for Jio GigaFiber since the Mukesh Ambani led telco will strive to differentiate itself from all the other broadband providers out there who have remained inconsistent and people dependent for their services. However, Reliance Jio wants to make the services consistent and to accomplish that, the telco will be laying more focus on increasing its network capacity.
Motilal Oswal, the brokerage firm also supported this claim as their statement said, “Management maintained that FY19 would continue witnessing heavy capex to complete mobility capex to increase network capacity and coverage to 99%. Post that, the focus will shift toward FTTH capex. We have increased our capex estimate to Rs. 600 billion (v/s Rs 400bn earlier). Bharti Airtel and Vodafone Idea’s India capex guidance stands at Rs. 220 billion and Rs. 150 billion, respectively. This highlights Reliance Jio’s capex intensity, which is nearly 3-4x compared to incumbents.”
In recent developments, Jio invested in Den Networks and Hathway Broadband to ramp its Jio GigaFiber rollout. It will be interesting to see how this investment goes in the future.
