India's largest conglomerate Reliance Industries held its 41st Annual General Meeting in Mumbai. Every AGM of this Mukesh Ambani-led company has always been seen as a platform for significant announcements and launches from the company. Two AGMs ago was when it's disruptive telecom service Reliance Jio was officially launched.
This year's AGM saw several announcements such as Jio Giga Fiber, the next Jio Phone and more. Here are the major takeaways:
Jio GigaFiber:
Jio announced that it will be extending its wired broadband service to homes, merchants, small and medium enterprises and large enterprises. This will be simultaneously launched across 1,100 cities. Mukesh Ambani claims that this service to I'll be the most advanced fiber-based broadband connectivity solutions.
It is expected to offer five services – home automation, home surveillance, landline, TV and Broadband.
Ambani claims that it will boost smart home solutions for consumers, empower small and large businesses to use digital tools and techniques.
Consumers can start registering for JioGigaFiber through both MyJio and Jio.com starting August 15. The rollout will be prioritised in those localities from where highest number of registrations are made.
GigaTV set-top box
Along with Jio GigaFiber, Reliance also announced the GigaTV set-top-box, which will offer internet-based digital content services to consumers. It will also give them access to Jio’s app suite. It will be voice-enabled and allow users to give voice commands in various Indian languages.
This set-top-box is touted to come with advanced features such as video calling feature, allowing users to make video calls from their televisions. However, there is no information on how it would function since TVs don’t come with in-built cameras.
The Jio GigaTV set-top box will come with over 600 movie channels, 1000s of movies and millions of songs.
JioPhone 2
After launching JioPhone last year that garnered 250 million users, Reliance has announced that it will make available JioPhone 2 starting August 15 at an introductory price of only Rs 2,999.
JioPhone2 will have added functionalities and strong retail presence across India.
JioPhone Monsoon Offer
Mukesh Ambani also launched the Monsoon Hungama offer. Under this offer, by exchanging your old feature phone, consumers can get a brand new JioPhone for an effective entry price of just Rs 501.
New features on JioPhone
Reliance has announced that the three most popular apps YouTube, WhatsApp and Facebook will be available to all the JioPhone users from August 15.
JioPhone 2 was launched last year for a fully refundable deposit of Rs 1,500. This offer will continue.