Reliance Jio Infocomm has objected to the telecom regulator’s recent recommendation of an uniform spectrum usage charge of 3% of revenues after 1st April 2014, for all spectrum acquired through an auction. Reliance Jio is the telecom venture of Reliance Industries. It acquired 20Mhz pan-India spectrum in 2.3GHz band through an auction in June 2010 at a price of Rs128bn. The spectrum carries a charge of 1%.
Reliance Jio had acquired 20Mhz pan-India spectrum in the 2.3GHz band in June/2010 through an auction and it expected launch using the TD-LTE technology. Unfortunately poor handset ecosystem has been a key roadblock for the service launch. The recent recommendation from TRAI ( the regulator ) has reduced the reserve price of spectrum to Rs 15bn/Mhz for pan-India spectrum in the 1800Mhz band. We believe this provide Reliance Jio with an opportunity to re-enter the Indian telecom market by acquiring a spectrum which has well-developed handset ecosystem for 2G,3G & 4G services. IT is also well known that Videocon Telecom is purportedly backed by Mukesh Ambani has managed to get some spectrum in the Nov-2012 Auction which it intends to use to rollout 2G Voice and 4G LTE services.
Reliance Jio Infocomm has tied up with Reliance Communications for Inter-City OFC Network and Tower Sharing Deal. Reliance Jio is relying on Bharti Airtel’s ILD Circuit for International Bandwidth.