MUMBAI: There’s further disruption coming thanks to the Reliance Jio juggernaut. Reliance Industries chairman Mukesh Ambani has said this time and time again for the mobile space where price wars have seen call and data prices plummeting, making consumers rub their hands in glee.
And now this was reiterated by Reliance Jio president network, global strategy and service development Matthew O Oommen, according to a report on telecoms.com of his key note address at the Big Communications Event in Texas earlier this week. Said he: “ We disrupted the mobile industry and now we are looking further. India and Jio are just getting started.”
The “further” he is referring to is wired broadband services to the home as well as to business customers. Its aggression in the telecom space has seen it snare 186 million subscribers for its 4G services who accounted for 372 billion minutes of VOLTE calls (in Q1 of this year) and 2.4 billion hours of video each month.
Ambani has set an even more ambitious target: that of an overall 500 million subscribers for its video-centric network.
But it has set its sights on shaking up the broadband FTTH and enterprise solutions segment as well. Just like it is doing in the 4G space where it is driving innovation in pricing, delivery and product. Tests have been on in different cities for its FTTH service with select residential and enterprise customers.
Oommen, during his keynote in Texas, said that the Reliance Jio philosophy is disrupt or be disrupted and that both segments are relatively under-served. There are just18 million broadband residential customers and the enterprise market is just one fifth of the size it could be, he shared in India, he stated, according to telecoms.com.
He also proudly claimed that FTTH will also see innovation as has been evidenced in the wireless segment with its MyJio app which has had 150 million downloads, with the JioTV service signing up 100 million subs and JioChat 50 million. Among the other services figure: JioBank, JioHealthHub and JioMusic which is slated to get a pump up with the acquisition of global Indian music leading streaming music service Saavn.com.
Are the existing wired broadband providers ready for the coming meltdown? Watch this space!
