Over 100 million consumers on Reliance Jio’s telecom network will be able to access 4G services at ₹303 a month once its free offer comes to an end on March 31. Users will get 30 GB of data each month with a daily cap of 1GB. All voice calls, be it local, STD or national roaming, will continue to be free, the company announced.
This tariff plan will be available to all existing customers for 12 months for a one-time enrolment fee of ₹99. New customers, who sign up on or before March 31, will also be eligible. After March 31, RJio will launch other tariff plans.
To ring-fence its subscribers from any counter-offers by rivals, RJio has also announced that it will not only match the cheapest tariff in the market but also offer 20 per cent more data than other operators. Announcing the Prime Membership scheme, Mukesh Ambani, Chairman, Reliance Industries, said: “...just five months after Jio’s launch, Jio users consumed more than 100 crore GB of data. Today, India is the No. 1 country in the world for mobile data usage. Jio users consume nearly as much data as the entire US and nearly 50 per cent more mobile data than all of China.”
Speaking about the 100-million subscriber addition, Ambani said RJio added nearly seven customers on its network every second, every day for the past 170 days.
Fare war coming? Industry analysts said that though this is good news for consumers, incumbent operators will feel the heat. “If they were hoping for a respite, then that is not happening. We are in for a phase of hyper competition that will lead to consolidation,” said a telecom analyst. However, Rjio’s users will have to commit at least ₹303 a month. The majority of mobile users do not spend more than ₹150 a month.
Therefore, Rajan Mathews, Director General, Cellular Operators Association of India, representing the incumbent operators, did not sound nervous. “The market place will now become the place where consumer choice and preference will be revealed,” Mathews said.