War For Domination: Airtel Vs Reliance Jio

Reliance Jio became the pioneer to offer free internet services in its promotional period. Since then internet charges from rival companies have dropped considerably. Reliance started a war with other telecom providers with the launch of Jio and ever since has been coming up with new and improved offers that challenge the prices of other companies. Recently, Reliance launched its JioPhone, an internet-enabled feature phone, for a refundable price of Rs 1500. This rocked the earth beneath the feet of both telecom providers and handset providers. It was reported that Airtel and Vodafone were in between talks with handset providers to launch phones at similar prices. However, it is being reported that Airtel is not offering a feature phone, but a fully loaded smartphone for a price slightly higher than JioPhone.

A source involved in the plans revealed that the smartphone will come with Airtel-enabled 4G internet and will be launched in the days around Diwali. Attractive voice and internet plans are also in reports to attract more customers to India’s already largest telecom provider. Other features of the smartphone include a dual sim slot with both the sim cards running on 4G, dual cameras, 1 GB RAM, a 4-inch touchscreen, VoLTE Calling, and a longer battery life. All these features in a price that compares to most feature phones is quite attractive and will surely bring in a lot of customers. The booking dates have not been announced yet.

JioPhone had nearly 6 million bookings in three days, since its launch on August 24. Airtel plans to counter this market by targeting the people who wish to upgrade to a smartphone from a feature phone but do not wish to spend too much. However, even though the source revealed quite a few details about the plans, Airtel declined to comment on any market speculation basing its argument on company policy.