Reliance Jio 4G service for employees to start on December 28

Mumbai: Telecom arm of RIL, Reliance Jio, on Sunday announced the launch of 4G service for its employees under Jio brand name which will be available from tomorrow.

"Today, on the eve of the 83rd birthday of Dhirubhai, my father, it is my proud privilege to invite all our Reliance families and friends to be the first to experience Jio's services starting tomorrow and in coming weeks.

"While you enjoy Jio Digital Life, I am also counting on you, as part of my family, to be part of co-creating the best experience for all our customers," Reliance Industries Limited Chairman and Managing Director Mukesh Ambani said at the event.

The company is offering Jio mobile service for free to its over 1 lakh employees as of now which will start tomorrow.

"I want all of you to take 5 things back: digital life, connected intelligence, Jio life, Jio together and Why Jio? Because life is going digital. Let me now welcome Jio," he said at the event.

The company, in a presentation at the event, claimed that Jio 4G will deliver 10 times higher download speed and 4 times better upload speed compared to others. Airtel, Idea Cellular, Vodafone and Aircel have already launched commercial 4G services in the market.

Brand Ambassador of Jio, Shah Rukh Khan, said, "Our service providers for everything say its 4G, but it is neither 4G nor 3G. If God is kind, you can get 2G on it. On Jio you will always find 4G." He said there are 150 handsets available in the country which support 4G of Jio and mobile phones with 3G and 2G network support only can access Jio Wi-Fi.

The company is also offering 25 per cent discount on its 'LYF' brand 4G smartphones to its employees.

Jio is expected to roll out 4G service commercially around March-April next year. The launch marks the re-entry of Mukesh Ambani in the mobile service business.

In 2003, he had launched Reliance's CDMA mobile business as Reliance Infocomm on the same day as the birth anniversary of RIL group founder and his father Dhirubhai with the tag line 'Kar Lo Duniya Mutthi Mein'.

The business is now Reliance Communications and is being handled by brother Anil, who was also present at the event. The two brothers have already come together for the sharing of mobile airwaves or spectrum as well as infrastructure like mobile towers and masts.​

Khan performed at the function and the hit song 'Gerua', from his latest movie 'Dilwale', too, featured as part of his set. Musician AR Rahman also performed at the event and treated the audience to the famous 'Jai Ho' song and a track from 'Swades'.

The launch event was held at Reliance Corporate Park while other RIL employees were virtually connected at around 1,000 locations, including in Dallas in the USA. "India is ranked around 150 in the Internet and mobile broadband penetration out of 230 countries, Jio is conceived to change this. "I have no doubt that with the launch of Jio, India's rank will go up from around 150 to among the top ten in the next few years for Internet and mobile broadband penetration," said Mukesh Ambani.

The function saw the RIL CMD's children, Akash Ambani and Isha?Ambani, anchoring the show to start the event. Mukesh Ambani's mother Kokilaben lit the lamps and she was joined by him, his wife Nita Ambani and children Akash, Anant and Isha on the dais. "Today is a proud day for any mother to see her children take flight. We will use Jio to deliver health and education across the country. It will break the rural-urban divide. "Jio is not just 4G, it is an ecosystem that will prepare the future generation for the world," Nita Ambani said.

The entire live-cast of the event is said to have been connected via Jio's own digital network to demonstrate capabilities of the network for enterprises and corporates in India, which is specifically targeting large distribution companies, a source said. Reliance Jio holds the biggest chunk of liberalised spectrum among telecom operators and that can be used for deploying any technology for mobile services.

A video presentation showed features of Jio's optical fibre service promising video calling feature using smart television sets, Internet speed of up to 1 gigabit per second.

The Jio TV service will accept voice command to change channels and subscriber will not require remote control to do so. According to field trials by brokerage firm Credit Suisse, download speed on 4G network of Reliance Jio during beta-test peaked at 70 megabit per second but remained in 15-30 mbps range on most occasions.