India Telcom (Future Big-Time)

TELECOM Ultra Reliant

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India’s Reliance Jio Platforms is having a global moment. The 3.5-year-old telecom is a subsidiary of Reliance Industries, India’s largest publicly traded company. Jio Platforms has huge ambitions, and high-profile backers are coming along for the ride, investing over $10 billion into the Indian telecom in under a month.  Microsoft could be next. The Seattle company is in talks to invest up to $2 billion in Jio Platforms, Indian newspaper Mint reported last week.  About that bandwagon... On April 21, Facebook announced a $5.7 billion investment for a 9.99% interest. Over the next few weeks, Jio took in $1.5 billion from Vista Equity Partners, $750 million from Silver Lake, $1.5 billion from KKR, and $870 million from General Atlantic.  Mubadala, Abu Dhabi’s state investment fund, is in talks to invest $1 billion as well, per Reuters. Google has also held discussions with Jio Platforms, but is currently focused on investing in a rival—Vodafone’s Indian operation, the FT reported last week.  Jio Platform’s story The telecom tapped into India’s booming mobile industry by offering cheap pricing for 4G subscriptions. The gambit paid off, and Jio Platforms quickly became India’s largest telecom operator with over 388 million subscribers. Many of these mobile users came online for the first time via Jio Platform’s services.  In addition to operating a nationwide network, Jio Platforms also offers mobile, e-commerce, and payments services—and has a new war chest to build out 5G networks.  Bottom line: Big Tech is interested in taking a stake in Jio Platforms because it gives them a beachhead in India; with 600 million users, the country is the world’s second largest internet market to China.