Reliance Jio’s plan launch triggers mobile data rate cut

Bloomberg

Billionaire Mukesh Ambani’s plan to begin mobile services at Reliance Jio Infocomm Ltd by August has caused incumbent operators led by Bharti Airtel Ltd to cut data tariffs to stem defections.
Airtel will offer prepaid customers as much as 67 percent more data for the same fees, according to a statement from India’s largest mobile company Sunday.
Idea, the third-biggest operator controlled by billionaire Kumar Mangalam Birla’s Aditya Birla group, is offering as much as 45 percent more data, the mobile company said July 15.
Jio, whose strategy is to offer high-speed data cheaply to lure users, faces a rate fight even before starting operations as it missed multiple deadlines, giving rivals time to improve their networks and come up with revised plans. The Reliance company will offer only fourth-generation services in India, the world’s second-largest smartphone market where users are projected to double in a few years from 220 million at present.
Vodafone India Ltd, the country’s second-biggest mobile operator, didn’t immediately respond to an e-mailed request for comment on its rates.
The top three operators together control about 60 percent of the Indian mobile market by users.
Jio has 1.5 million customers in its beta tests and is in the process of evaluating when to begin commercial operations, Anshuman Thakur, the company’s head of strategy, told reporters July 15.