Reliance Jio organised its 45th annual general meeting today and made some major announcements on the event related to its 5G service roll out plans, much talked about Jio 5G smartphones, JioAirFibre, its Green energy initiative and more. The meeting was livestreamed across various social media platforms including company’s Koo account.
Here are the details on some of the major announcements made by Jio today:
Jio 5G services: Reliance Jio’s 5G services which is currently in pilot testing mode will launch by Diwali this year with pan-India coverage to happen by December 2023. Just like the Jio 4G services, the Jio 5G will also happen in a phased manner with Delhi, Mumbai, Chennai and Kolkata cities to get it first. Jio aims to connect over 100 million homes using its 5G services. Jio claims that its 5G services will double the number of connected internet devices from current 800 million to 1.5 billion in a year.
In contrast to other service providers that are planning to launch non-standalone 5G technology, Jio says that it will deploy the latest version of 5G, called Stand-Alone 5G which is comparatively more powerful and offers services such as ultra low latency, high speed connectivity, massive machine-to-machine communication, 5G voice, Edge computing and network slicing, and metaverse. Jio said that its 5G services will be “True 5G in every sense”.
“In addition to the 3500 MHz mid-band which is globally earmarked for 5G, and the 26 GHz millimetre-wave band for ultra-high capacity, only Jio has the 700 MHz low-band spectrum which is essential for deep indoor coverage. And we are able to seamlessly combine these frequencies into a single powerful ‘data highway’, using an advanced technology, called Carrier Aggregation,” said Mukesh Ambani.
The company has made a total investment of 2 lakh crore to build its 5G network in India and will further use its combined wireless and wireline assets to cover India’s total land mass of 3.3 million square kilometres. The RIL chief said that Jio 5G will help connecting the remotest parts of the country.
JioAirFibre: Jio announced JioAirFibre, its fixed-broadband service that will complement its 5G service coming by the end of October this year. To use the device, you will have to plug it in and turn it on to create your personal Wi-Fi hotspot.
“With the simplicity of JioAirFibre, hundreds of millions of homes and offices can be connected to ultra-high-speed broadband in a very short period,” Ambani said in his keynote speech, adding “with it, India can rank among the Top-10 nations, even for fixed broadband.”
Jio 5G smartphone: Jio has further announced its collaboration with Google to develop “ultra-affordable 5G smartphones” for India. Jio said that it currently has “well-established relationships” with global tech-giants like Meta, Google, Microsoft, Ericsson, Nokia, Samsung and Cisco. The company has also joined hands with Qualcomm to develop 5G solutions for India.
Jio Cloud PC: Jio launched Jio Cloud PC- its virtual PC hosted in the cloud using Jio 5G. The company claims that Jio Cloud PC will offer PC-like power to every home and business in India at affordable costs. “This will be a game-changer for every student, every gig-worker, every small business in our country. Be it a pharmacy or a doctor’s clinic, a grocer or a hotel, a consultant or a Chartered Accountant, everyone can get an affordable computer through Jio Cloud PC and JioAirFiber,” said the company.
JioMart in WhatsApp: Jio also announced its collaboration with Meta to launch JioMart right within the WhatsApp. The consumers will be able to shop from JioMart right within their WhatsApp chat. It will let consumers browse through JioMart’s entire grocery catalog, add items to cart, and make the payment to complete the purchase – all within the WhatsApp chat.
ALSO READ | Jio to launch its True 5G services in India by Diwali, pan-India coverage by Dec 2023
