Jio's Subscriber ARPU per month in the recently announced plans works out to Rs166/Rs143, which is higher than ARPU of Rs110 implied for the Dhan Dhana Dhan plan. This may seem a relief for A-Vo-Id Operators, and it brings relief to smaller telcos that were getting priced out by JIO, though they seem to have thrown in the towel. Having said that, JIO remains cheaper than A-Vo-Id Operators on data pricing.
The Summer Surprise (SS) offer of most of JIO?s 72m paid subscribers as of end-March will expire in early August. Hence, it is
surprising that JIO chose to raise pricing ahead of this lumpy renewal, which we interpret as a sign of increasing confidence (it is
unlikely that JIO missed this consideration, or it was probably exhausting budgets or reacting to adverse publicity relating to
"unprecedented disruption from a new entrant"). JIO currently has ~87m subscribers. We expected a smaller increase followed by
another increase a couple of months later.
