The world's most affordable smartphone just became more attractive.
Who says feature phones have become a thing of past?
Reliance-Google's new smartphone has got mixed reviews from analysts and brokerages. The phone pricing is seen unattractive for low-end customers and bundled offers are being viewed as non-disruptive. While this could slow the pace of adoption, it could set the stage for tariff hikes in the industry, feel analysts.
Used smartphones are gaining popularity in the hinterland, the main market for JioPhone. Share of JioPhone in the feature phone market had shrunk from 47% in Q2 of 2018 to 28% a year after.
It has captured 38 per cent of the feature phone segment in 2018 through frequent innovation, says Arnab Dutta.
Losing subscribers for the fourth straight month, Reliance Jio witnessed 3.76 million users leave the telecom operator in October, data from the Telecom Regulatory Authority of India (Trai) showed on Monday. Meanwhile, Bharti Airtel reversed three months of decline, and added 1.92 million users, indicating it has overcome the impact of the broad-based tariff hikes imposed by private sector telcos in July.
Reliance Jio's major subscriber losses continued for the third straight month with 7.96 million users leaving the telecom operator in September, even as the state-owned BSNL stood out as the lone gainer, data from the Telecom Regulatory Authority of India (Trai) showed on Thursday. Market leader Jio's subscriber loss has continued since July when the three private telecom operators - Jio, Bharti Airtel, and Vodafone Idea (Vi) - brought in a broad-based hike in tariffs.
The launch of Reliance Jio Infocomm Ltd last September, particularly the tariff war it has unleashed on its competitors, has deepened the crisis facing India's telecom sector. One offshoot of this is the major drop in earnings reported by industry leaders Bharti Airtel and Idea Cellular with each passing quarter. Aslam Hunani/Rediff.com tells the story in numbers.
The company has similar pact with Bharti Infratel.
The effective cost of the fully made-in-India phone will be zero, as against the minimum Rs 3-4.5k cost for a smartphone, Ambani said.
At Rs 2,999, LYF Flame is one of the most affordable VoLTE smartphone in the market now.
The much-awaited soft launch of Reliance Jio's next-generation mobile services has been delayed by another month.
Billionaire Mukesh Ambani's Reliance Jio on Friday announced deferring the roll-out of the JioPhone Next - the low-priced smartphone it has developed with Google - to Diwali. The phone was previously to be launched on September 10. Ambani at the shareholder meeting of his flagship Reliance Industries in June, had stated that the JioPhone Next will be available for purchase on September 10.
In the third infrastructure sharing agreement between firms run by brothers Mukesh and Anil Ambani, Reliance Industries' telecom arm has agreed to use Reliance Communication Ltd's intra-city fibre network to roll out 4G services.
Surajeet Das Gupta explains why Mukesh Ambani's target is by no means impossible.
In what could be one of the largest launches in the telecom services space, Reliance Jio Infocomm is set to roll out its 4G LTE services in 800 Indian cities between April and June next year.
Samsung makes the largest number of non-4G feature phones in India
Jio announces an array of communication and entertainment devices.
Reliance group firm employee under the scheme can invite 10 people to buy Jio's 4G sim and LYF Handset.
'There is no doubt at all that Jio's disruption of the mobile broadband market was a turning point for India's digital economy.'
Reliance Jio may not ask for a premium for its 5G services in the initial stages of the launch, according to sources in the company. The company will roll out 5G commercial services in four cities -Delhi, Mumbai, Chennai, and Kolkata - around Diwali this month and slowly ramp up the processes for other cities, too. A senior executive, when asked whether Jio will charge higher tariffs for 5G against 4G, said: "In the initial stages, customers have to adopt 5G, then they will have to find value in the service, and then one can look at monetisation."
Telcos Reliance Jio and Bharti may post a 5-7 per cent sequential rise in revenue with a steady margin for the second quarter of FY22, according to Jefferies. Bharti's growth will be led by segmented tariff hikes taken in the second quarter ended September, while Jio's growth will be driven by continued subscriber growth, it further said. Jefferies expects the outlook on tariff hikes for Bharti, further details on JioPhone Next for Jio, and tenancy outlook for Indus Towers to be the key things to watch for in the September quarter.
Reliance Jio Infocomm Ltd on Friday tested its 4G network at the Techfest event in IIT Bombay campus by running trials of video calls and Jio television service, among others.
The company is offering its own devices under the brand name Lyf along with other brands to employees at a 25 per cent discount.
'The first time India has seen two consecutive blockbuster IPO years.'
Mukesh Ambani's Jio Financial Services (JFS) is set to seek shareholders' approval for its leasing subsidiary to acquire telecom equipment and devices worth Rs 36,000 crore ($4.33 billion) from Reliance Retail. Jio Leasing Services Limited (JLSL), a wholly-owned subsidiary of JFS, plans to enter the device leasing business, and the equipment will be deployed in broadband wireless connectivity and other services.
The late entrant Jio Chat has launched with both video and voice calling services.
Reliance Jio test launched its services last December, but dates for commercial launch has not been announced.
According to documents accessed by Business Standard, RIL increased its direct stake in Jio to 98.9 per cent as on March this year by pumping more capital into the company.
To help 2G customers who have to buy a new phone to upgrade to 4G, the company had earlier introduced 4G feature phones, to make it affordable for them to make the switch.
US technology company NVIDIA and billionaire Mukesh Ambani's Reliance Industries on Friday announced a partnership to build AI supercomputers in India. "The companies will work together to build AI infrastructure that is over an order of magnitude more powerful than the fastest supercomputer in India today," the firms said in a statement. Days before the announcement, NVIDIA founder and CEO Jensen Huang met Prime Minister Narendra Modi on Monday.
Isha's stab at the bottom of the laptop pyramid shows she is a true Ambani.
Jio to charge users 6 paisa/min for voice calls made to rival phone networks. However, these charges are not applicable on calls made by Jio users to other Jio phones and to landline phones and calls made using WhatsApp, FaceTime and other such platforms.
Vi partners SpaceX-rival AST SpaceMobile for satcom service on smartphones
The development marks a watershed moment in India's telecom history since fixed-line or landline connections formed the final segment where a State-owned operator was in the top spot.
Jio has partnered with AeroMobile to launch mobile services on 22 flights on international routes, with plans starting at Rs 499 per day.
RIL has been talking to groups including Gionee, Huawei and Xiaomi
From January 1, all these iPhone users will get the Rs 1,499 plan completely free for 1 year, which equals value worth Rs 18,000
The revival of feature phones in India is driven by low-cost access to the internet, but the 'dumb phones' are learning to get smart and create a niche, says Veer Arjun Singh.
Vodafone and Bharti have pointed out that, for data, their revenue realisation should be at Rs 30-35 per GB for them to cover their costs as opposed to the current figure of over Rs 11 per GB. But Jio has suggested a gradual increase to Rs 15 per GB and then maybe to Rs 20 per GB after six to nine months.
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