By – Four Arrows
Mukesh Ambani, the director of Reliance Industries, an Indian oil refinery holding company, invested $ 35 billion to build Jio, the country's first 4G network with VoLTE communications. The operator debuted in 2016. To expand the number of members, it offers free calls and low-cost mobile Internet access, as well as a low-cost 4G phone for $ 20. Indian users still need to use pirate proxy services sometimes because of ISP blocking.
As a result, communication costs in India have dropped considerably, and 4G internet is now available in 99 percent of the country for 1.3 billion people. In terms of traffic consumption, India has risen from 155th to first place in the world in just two years.
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Analysts predict that by 2020, Jio's subscriber base will reach 400 million and that by 2021, the business will be the leader of India's telecoms market, with 500 million customers. Mukesh doesn't stop there: on top of Jio, he's creating a digital platform to compete with Amazon and Google by selling content, retail services, and advertising.
According to analysts, Mukesh had to invest billions of dollars from the oil sector for six years in an unpromising telecom route in order to establish Jio and accomplish its ambitions, and then actively break down and give conditions that its competitors could not offer.
Mukesh's father, Anil Ambani, started Reliance Industries in 1966, which developed into the country's largest holding firm with holdings in finance, telecommunications, energy, oil, and other industries worth more than $ 110 billion.
His father died of a stroke in 2002, leaving no will, and the brothers took over joint administration of the empire. Mukesh felt compelled to carry on his father's dream of "cheaper mobile calls than postcards," and in December 2002, he established Reliance Infocomm (RCOMM), a telecommunications company based on the CDMA standard (a competitor to GSM communications, a standard that does not work at a specific frequency, but shares subscribers' signals across the entire available frequency range).
Mukesh saw that in order for RComm to be successful in the market, it needed to be progressive. For this, he chose the high-speed CDMA system, which could deliver both calls as well as fast Internet and other services. On the anniversary of Mukesh's father's birthday, December 28, 2003, RComm was released. RComm was able to reach the top three companies in India's mobile services industry because of aggressive price cuts and innovative content services.
In 2004-2005, the brothers clashed over Reliance's assets: Anil accused Mukesh of unlawfully financing RComm at the expense of the main company's assets, and Mukesh claimed that he acquired RComm nearly free of charge. The mother stepped in to mediate the conflict, forcing a truce.
Photo by NeONBRAND on Unsplash
Mukesh had to decide whether to keep a consistently lucrative oil refinery or RComm for himself. As a result, he gave RComm to Anil and also went into a non-competition agreement, which stated that the brothers would not be able to establish enterprises in each other's spheres of activity until 2010.
According to Reliance staff, the brothers' business attitude was drastically different. If RComm was Mukesh's life, Anil's was simpler and more greedy: he rushed companies to the IPO, pleased with short-term earnings. Mukesh, on the other hand, worked on each firm down to the smallest detail, attending multi-hour meetings to oversee all internal operations.
Mukesh Ambani re-entered the telecoms sector in 2010, but with considerably higher ambitions: Jio will not just become a mobile operator, but also a massive platform for all kinds of digital services, occupying 50% of the Indian telecommunications market.
Mukesh Ambani's current bet is on mobile traffic rather than phone calls, which he made for free. He believes that data is the future, hence the primary goal is to build a database of customers who are eager to spend money on Internet-related services.
Also read: How Dhirubjai Ambani's Generosity Moved
Mukeshi wished to address one of the major issues confronting the Indian IT market: providing individuals with simple and low-cost access to fast Internet. Telecom companies did not develop services outside of the cities where roughly a billion people live: before Jio's debut, Internet penetration in India was barely 20%.
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Keywords: Mukesh Ambani, 4G, Telecommunication, Reliance