Reliance Jio pitches for spectrum auction; says delay will hurt exchequer

 Reliance Jio has yet again pitched for spectrum auction as the company feels that there is an urgency for better quality of service.

The company, in a letter to the Department of Telecommunications, said there was an an urgent need for immediate auction of all the available spectrum in all bands.

Jio went onto to say that the delay in auction is hurting the national exchequer as well and also making investors jittery as perceived against the principle of ease of doing business.

“We are unable to find any reasonable rationale behind this sudden pause in a successful and fruitful policy of auctioning all available spectrum every year, since the Hon’ble Supreme Court decision in 2012,” Jio said.

Reliance Jio's 2G-free India drive likely to hit Vodafone Idea hard

Mukesh Ambani’s plan to make India ‘2G-mukt’ will hit the incumbent operators hard, especially Vodafone Idea given its large base of 2G subscribers.
After racking up 100 million users for its 4G-enabled feature phones (JioPhone), Reliance Jio in partnership with Google is eyeing the entry-level smartphone segment. Jio is planning to win over 350 million 2G feature phone users by launching a smartphone ‘at a fraction of the current cost’.
Experts believe that Jio, which dominates the mobile broadband space (4G) with 58 per cent market share, could capture the incumbents’ market share in the feature phone segment with its new offering.
While Bharti Airtel has 135 million 2G users, 47 per cent of its total subscriber base of 283 million, Vodafone Idea has 174 million 2G users, about 60 per cent of its total subscriber base of 291 million at the end of the March quarter.
Mayuresh Joshi, head of equity research at William O’Neil India, says: “Vodafone Idea has the highest 2G subscriber base among the top three operators. This coupled with a weak financial situation and inability to commit large capex investment will make it the most susceptible to subscriber loss. The ongoing churn for Vodafone could accelerate if Jio is able to launch a smartphone at a substantially lower cost in partnership with Google.”
Reliance Jio's 2G-free India drive likely to hit Vodafone Idea hard
Unlike Bharti Airtel which has recently raised capital and is comfortable on the net debt to operating profit metric, Vodafone Idea will find it difficult to protect its market share due to high leverage.
The company’s payouts going ahead include adjusted gross revenue (AGR) dues as well as deferred spectrum payments. Even with a deferred AGR payment, Motilal Oswal Financial Services estimates that the company would require an operating profit of Rs 30,000 crore in financial year 2021-22 to meet its capex, interest costs, deferred spectrum liability and part payment of AGR dues.

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The company is expected to generate less than half that operating profit in FY22 at Rs 13,200 crore.
This will require the company to raise its average revenue per user (ARPU) by 53 per cent to Rs 190 from Rs 121 at present. Given the higher share of entry-level and rural base, Vodafone has the lowest ARPU in the sector.
Angel Broking believes that increased subscriber churn without fixation of floor tariffs and no major relief from the Supreme Court on the AGR matter will make it difficult for Vodafone Idea to survive in the industry.
The stock of Vodafone Idea has slipped 16 per cent over the last two trading sessions.

Jio sets off new telecom war with Voda Idea, Airtel over premium plans

Reliance Jio and Vodafone Idea are set for a legal battle which will determine the future of lucrative data plans. On Tuesday, the Mukesh Ambani-controlled company appealed to the Telecom Disputes Settlement and Appellate Tribunal (TDSAT) to hear its side before passing any order on Vodafone Idea's petition against the regulatory curbs on premium plans, triggering a new faceoff in the financially stressed industry.
Reliance Jio, on whose complaint the Telecom Regulatory Authority of India (TRAI) on July 11 blocked the premium plans of Vodafone Idea and Bharti Airtel, has filed an application with the telecom tribunal. Jio’s application is yet to be admitted.
The TDSAT will hear Vodafone’s appeal on Thursday as Trai sought time to file reply.
Premium plans are important contributors to average revenue per user (ARPU) of the two telcos Bharti Airtel and Vodafone Idea.
They are already grappling with the issue of pending dues linked to AGR (adjusted gross revenue) in the Supreme Court.
The AGR case, mandating telecom companies to pay a total of Rs 1.47 trillion, is coming up for hearing on July 20. Telcos have made part payment of the dues.
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In the tariff plan case, the dispute is primarily over Vodafone's RedX plan launched last November. Customers were offered unlimited local and STD calls, unlimited data, up to 50 per cent higher data speed, premier customer service and Netflix subscription. The scheme was amended in May. As of June, RedX had notched up 127,000 subscribers. While Jio — for long the disruptor in the telecom industry— has termed the premium data plan discriminatory, Vodafone has called the complaint unsubstantiated and vague.
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In its application at TDSAT, Jio said it would be directly affected by the outcome of Vodafone's appeal. The company added that the outcome would impact fair competition and therefore the manner in which it conducts business. It would be determinative of the tariff plans that the applicant as well as its competitors can validly offer, Jio said. In its appeal, Vodafone Idea listed the chronology of events leading to suspension of its RedX plan. On July 8, Reliance Jio complained to Trai about Vodafone's RedX scheme. On July 9, Trai informed Vodafone about the complaint and the next day sought details about the plan. On July 11, Trai asked the company to withhold the plan, it said.

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Jio, in its complaint to Trai, said the premium data offerings were fraught with issues and could be in non-compliance of regulatory oversight. Among other things it said that no operator can give a guarantee to any customer for any minimum speed.
Vodafone Idea has said Jio's allegations were aimed at disturbing its smooth functioning. While seeking a stay on the Trai order, Vodafone Idea said the regulator acted in haste without hearing its views. The Trai order is arbitrary and illegal and amounts to pre-judging the issue, the plea stated. The RedX scheme has been in operation for the last eight months and during this period Trai never raised an issue regarding the plan being non-compliant, Vodafone Idea argued.

Intel Capital invests Rs 1,894 crore for a 0.39% stake in Jio Platforms

Intel Capital will invest Rs 1,894.50 crore in Reliance Industries' Jio Platforms at an equity value of Rs 4.91 trillion and an enterprise value of Rs 5.16 trillion for a 0.39 per cent stake, said the two companies on Friday.
This will be the twelfth international deal for Reliance's digital arm in less than three months, taking the total investment amount to Rs 117,588.45 crore.
"Excited to work together with Intel to advance India’s capabilities in cutting-edge technologies that will empower all sectors of our economy and improve the quality of life of 1.3 billion Indians," said RIL Chairman Mukesh Ambani.
Other global players who have invested in Jio Platforms since April 22, 2020 are - Facebook, Silver Lake, Vista Equity Partners, General Atlantic, KKR, Mubadala, ADIA, TPG, L Catterton and PIF .
With more than 388 million users, Jio has forced out several rivals and driven consolidation in the sector since entering the market in 2016 with free voice services and cut-price data.
Wendell Brooks, Intel Capital President, said that Jio Platforms' focus on applying its impressive engineering capabilities to bring the power of low-cost digital services to India aligns with Intel's purpose of delivering breakthrough technology that enriches lives.

"We believe digital access and data can transform business and society for the better.
Through this investment, we are excited to help fuel digital transformation in India, where Intel maintains an important presence," Brooks said.

Jio poised to play key role in development of 5G ecosystem in India: RIL

Reliance Jio would play a key role in the development of the 5G ecosystem in India based on the market dynamics, Reliance Industries said in its latest annual report.
On the issue of floor price for mobile services, the company noted that market dynamics have improved in the recent past as reflected by December tariff hikes by operators.

The government has also expressed its intentions of conducting the next round of spectrum auctions during the fiscal year 2020-21, it said.
"Jio with its 5G-ready network and extensive fiber assets, would play a key role in the development of the 5G ecosystem in India, based on market dynamics," the annual report stated.
In his letter to shareholders, Reliance Industries Chairman Mukesh Ambani said that there are still millions of 2G phone users, who cannot use internet, highlighting urgent need for India to transition fully from 2G to the 4G era and beyond, and underlining the opportunity Jio has in such transformation.
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"Over the past two years, JioPhone has successfully transitioned approximately 100 million erstwhile feature phone (2G) users to the 4G network," he said.
Ambani noted that Jio's success in building technology specifically for India and its ability to proliferate across the country has attracted global technology leaders Facebook and Microsoft to forge partnerships with it.
Reliance Jio continues to add subscribers at a rate unprecedented in the telecom world with 387.5 million mobile data subscribers (as of March 31, 2020), Ambani said.
Describing Jio as a key catalyst in creating the broadband data market in India, he said it is now the number one mobile telecom operator in the country by both adjusted gross revenue (AGR) and subscribers.
Reliance Jio is rolling out its state-of-the-art wireline services across homes and enterprises, he said adding all this will help place a strong foundation for offering platform-based digital services.
According to the report, Jio connected about one million homes with JioFiber services until March 2020.
Ambani further said that rollout of the digital commerce initiative will open up further growth opportunities for the organised retail business, leveraging the strength of consumer and digital platforms.
"Reliance Retail and WhatsApp have entered into a commercial partnership agreement to further accelerate Reliance Retail's Digital Commerce business on the JioMart platform using WhatsApp and to support small businesses on WhatsApp," he said.
Further, Jio said that market dynamics have improved in the recent past, as reflected by tariff hikes in December 2019, where all the operators revised their tariff plans upwards by up to 40 per cent.
"During the year, Telecom Regulatory Authority of India (TRAI) has also initiated consultation process on feasibility of establishing a floor price for mobility services in the country, it said, adding that Jio would continue to actively engage with the regulator and industry stakeholders to drive growth for all.
On the issue of call connect charges, where interconnect usage charge (IUC) would be reduced to zero with effect from January 1, 2021, Jio said it accordingly introduced a charge of 6 paise/minute on all off-net outgoing voice minutes to pass through the impact of change in regulatory stance on IUC in October 2019.
"This has led to a significant improvement in voice traffic mix as misusers of free voice services have left the network and Jio is now a net receiver of IUC. Jio continues to believe that transition to the BAK (Bill and Keep) regime will hasten the adoption of more efficient technologies like VoLTE, which have negligible cost for carrying and servicing essential voice services," RIL said.
In the recent months, Reliance Industries has secured over Rs 1.15 trillion from global tech investors including Facebook by selling a tad less than a quarter of its digital business and raised Rs 53,124 crore by selling shares to existing investors in the past days.
Sale of stake in Jio Platforms raised Rs 1,15,693.95 crore from marquee names including Facebook, Silver Lake, Vista Equity Partners, General Atlantic, KKR, Mubadala, ADIA, TPG, L Catterton and PIF since April 22, 2020.

Abu Dhabi state fund in talks to invest $1 bn in Jio Platforms: Report

Abu Dhabi state fund Mubadala Investment Company is in talks to invest about $1 billion in Reliance Industries' digital unit Jio platforms, three sources said on Thursday.
Jio Platforms, which houses music and movie apps as well a Reliance's telecoms venture Jio Infocomm, has secured a massive $10 billion from investors including Facebook Inc within a month.
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Reliance did not immediately respond to a request for comment.
"Clearly Jio's platform is attracting a wide range of world-class investors, given its enormous potential to serve one of the world's largest marketplaces," Mubadala said in an email to Reuters.

Reliance looks at Nasdaq listing for Jio Platforms; IPO likely by 2021

An overseas listing may be on the cards for Jio Platforms, the digital and telecommunications subsidiary of Reliance Industries (RIL). According to sources aware of the development, work in this regard may commence soon after RIL sells 20-25 per cent in Jio Platforms and the government issues direct listing guidelines.
In the past one month, five global players have picked up a 17.12 per cent stake in Jio Platforms for a total consideration of Rs 78,562 crore, valuing the company at Rs 4.91 trillion (or $73 billion).
Highly placed sources said once the new guidelines for direct international listing were announced by the government, the company would look at various global stock markets. On May 17, Finance Minister Nirmala Sitharaman had said Indian companies might be allowed direct overseas listing, without a simultaneous listing in the Indian market. Detailed guidelines are still in the works.
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While RIL hasn’t zeroed in on its options yet, Nasdaq, the sought-after stock exchange for technology companies in the US, is being considered as the preferred destination for the listing.
E-mail queries sent to RIL remained unanswered till the time of going to press.
chart“While a foreign listing may be a departure from RIL’s core belief of enhancing existing investors’ share value, international platforms may offer better liquidity to absorb a listing of Jio’s size when compared to the Indian market,” said a person in the know.
Morgan Stanley is likely to be appointed the lead banker to manage the overseas listing, while Bank of America Merrill Lynch and Citibank may also be roped in for the IPO, another source informed.
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In April last year, RIL had said it would list Jio in the next five years.
RIL struck its first major deal with US social media giant Facebook on April 22, to acquire 9.99 per cent in Jio Platforms. Later, RIL sold a 7.24 per cent stake to various private equity players such as Silver Lake, Vista Equity Partners, General Atlantic, and KKR, which have taken minority stakes of 1.15-2.32 per cent each so far in Jio Platforms.
Investors such as Saudi Arabia’s Public Investment Fund and Abu Dhabi’s Mubadala Investment Company are also likely to pick up similar minority interests in Jio Platforms, though these transactions may fructify in the next one to two months, sources said.
Anant Ambani joins Jio Platforms board
Reliance Industries Chairman Mukesh Ambani's youngest son, Anant, has been appointed additional director on the board of Jio Platforms. His elder siblings — Akash and Isha Ambani — had joined the boards of RIL’s telecom and retail ventures in 2014. Anant ( 25) has also been involved with activities of Reliance Foundation and the group’s sports business.

Jio tops mobile broadband speed in Feb, Vodafone leads in upload: Trai

Reliance Jio topped the 4G speed chart in February by recording average download speed of 21.5 megabits per second while Vodafone topped the chart in terms of upload speed, according to data published by the telecom regulator Trai.
According to the latest report, Jio pipped its nearest rivals Bharti Airtel and Vodafone who recorded an average download speed of 8 mbps in February.

The average speed is computed by Trai based on the data it collects across India with the help of its MySpeed application on a real-time basis.
Though Vodafone and Idea have merged their mobile businesses, Trai measured their performance separately as the integration of networks of both the companies is currently on.
The download speed helps in accessing content from various applications, while upload speed helps in sharing of content like photo, video, among others, by subscribers.
Vodafone topped the chart in terms of upload by recording speed of 6.5 mbps. It was followed by Idea which recorded upload speed of 5.5 mbps, Jio 3.9 mbps and Bharti Airtel 3.7 mbps.

Why putting on the squeeze won't tame India's credit and fiscal woes

The finance industry is in turmoil. Tax collections have hit stall speed. India’s credit and fiscal crises are joined at the hip.
Consider the $13 billion in past fees that the government is asking from telecom operators. It’s a desperate attempt to squeeze money from an industry in which most players have already vanished or gone bankrupt. The two old firms that are still standing amid intense price competition from newcomer Reliance Jio Infocomm Ltd. will bear the brunt of the recently court-approved demand.

Among them, Vodafone Idea Ltd. has a one-year default probability of 7.5%, according to a Bloomberg risk model. That puts its $14 billion debt within shouting distance of distressed. If Vodafone Idea goes to banks asking to recast its borrowings, something that the company has so far denied doing, lenders will receive a fresh blow.
India’s banks are miserable, and not just because they’ve already piled up $200 billion in bad debt. In at least five ways, New Delhi’s tax kitty, which has grown by just 1.5% so far this fiscal year, the slowest in a decade, is exacerbating lenders’ unease:
A resource-constrained government means that state-run banks, which control the bulk of India’s loan market, can’t expect to get enough of taxpayers’ money to make loan-loss provisions for past underwriting mistakes, let alone raise fresh capital for growth.
With the paucity of state funds curbing new road contracts, construction companies’ debt will also sour. They’ll be joining electricity producers that are stranded because financially stretched state utilities won’t award long-term power purchase agreements. Some states want to renege on existing deals, even as they sit on $8.5 billion of overdue payments.
As the government starts panicking about revenue, it will try to get funds wherever it can, such as by arm-twisting a telecom industry that has no capacity to pay.
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The tighter budgets mean that the government will shy away from using taxpayers’ money to untangle the mess in real estate. Shadow banks are in trouble--and dragging deposit-taking institutions with them--because of their outsize exposure to failed property projects. All that banks can do about defaulting financiers such as Dewan Housing Finance Corp. and Altico Capital India Ltd. is to pretend to restructure their borrowings and kick inevitable losses down the road.
Finally, after more than two years of tweaks and tinkering, a nationwide goods and services tax — the single-biggest economic reform of Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s government — is failing to generate the kind of fiscal resources that were hoped. The more the government tries to plug its shortfall, the more onerous for large firms to deal with smaller suppliers.
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The GST came a few months after Modi’s disastrous November 2016 ban on 86% of the currency then in circulation. The complicated levy has been an additional source of pain at a time of demand funk in nearly every industry. No surprise that the ratio of nonperforming loans for midsize Indian firms has shot up from 13% at the end of 2015 to 17.5%, compounding the misery for lenders.
Given the linkages between India’s credit and fiscal woes, partial solutions — such as making telecom firms cough up a lot of money suddenly — will only backfire. The twin challenges will have to be faced together.

Bad news for Jio users as calls to rival networks won't be free anymore

Forced by regulatory uncertainty over review of sunset clause for call termination charges, billionaire Mukesh Ambani's Reliance Jio on Wednesday announced it will charge customers 6 paise per minute for voice calls made to rival phone networks, but will compensate them by giving free data of equal value.
In a statement, Jio said the 6 paisa charge will remain in place till the time telecom operators are required to pay rivals for mobile phone calls made by their users to other operators' network.

These charges are not applicable on calls made by Jio users to other Jio phones and to landline phones and calls made using WhatsApp, FaceTime and other such platforms. Incoming calls from all networks will continue to be free.
Telecom regulator TRAI in 2017 had slashed the so-called interconnect usage charge (IUC) to 6 paise per minute from 14 paise and had said this regime will end by January 2020. But it has now floated a consultation paper to review whether the regime timeline needs to be extended.
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Since voice calls on Jio network are free, the company had to bear the Rs 13,500 crore payment made to rivals such as Bharti Airtel and Vodafone Idea. To recover the losses created by the TRAI move, the company has decided to charge customers 6 paise per minute for every call they make to a rival's network.
This will be the first time that Jio users will pay for voice calls.
Currently, Jio charges only for data, and voice calls to anywhere in the country and to any network are free.
"...The consultation paper has created regulatory uncertainty and therefore Jio has been compelled, most reluctantly and unavoidably, to recover this regulatory charge of 6 paise per minute for all off-net mobile voice calls so long as IUC charges exist," the statement said.
For all recharges done by Jio customers starting Wednesday, calls made to other mobile operators will be charged at the prevailing IUC rate of 6 paise per minute through IUC top-up vouchers till such time that TRAI moves to zero termination charge regime.
"Jio will provide additional data entitlement of equivalent value based on IUC top-up voucher consumption. This will ensure no increase in tariff for customers," Jio said.
Jio said it has, in last three years, paid other operators like Airtel and Vodafone-Idea nearly Rs 13,500 crore as net IUC charges.

Softbank eyes investment of $2-3 bn in Jio as Mukesh Ambani deleverages biz

Japan's Softbank is reportedly looking to make a $2-3 billion investment in India's fastest-growing telecom firm Reliance Jio as billionaire Mukesh Ambani looks to deleverage business by selling stakes.
This comes on the back of reports of Saudi giant Aramco in discussions to buy a 25 per cent stake in Reliance Industries' refining and petrochemical business for $10-15 billion.

"Softbank has long been seen as a potential investor in Jio," JPMorgan said in a research report. "For the past 2 years, our conversations with investors have highlighted expectations of Softbank investing in Jio and hence the news flow is not surprising." It, however, remains to be seen how much money does Softbank actually put in, what the implied equity valuation is and if the e-commerce venture is included in the Jio entity.
It was reported that SoftBank's Vision fund is currently undertaking due diligence to buy a stake in Jio Infocomm, which in September 2016 launched pure play fourth-generation or 4G technology-based telecom services and within a span of two years have become India's third largest telecom company with highest monthly subscriber additions.
Both Reliance and SoftBank spokespersons declined to comment on the matter.
"In our view, for a meaningful de-leveraging, investors would likely want to see an equity inflow of more than USD 5 billion from a single investor or a combination of investors," JPMorgan said valuing Jio at USD 50 billion.
It, however, put implied equity value at $25 billion. Reliance Retail was valued at an implied equity value of $35 billion.
"A potentially smaller equity sale, which although would establish a larger equity value of Jio, would not be seen as a meaningful positive, in our view," it said. "We also need to see what the potential stake sale would involve. More importantly, from a stock price perspective, we believe the potential investment would have to be an equity investment in Jio and not in the proposed InviT as that would be a quasi-debt investment." As of now, Jio is the carriage and content vehicle, while Reliance Retail is the offline retailer. It remains to be seen where the eventual commerce would sit - Jio or Retail, and whether it would be part of any Jio equity stake.
"Overall, we maintain our view that while the earnings environment for the company is deteriorating with downside risks to refining and petchem (petrochemical), stock multiples would keep on moving higher on expectations of potentially large stake sales on higher than current implied equity values for the various businesses," JPMorgan said.
In a separate report, HSBC Global Research said RIL's consolidated adjusted net debt has declined to $33.2 billion in the fourth quarter of 2018-19 that ended on March 31, from $42.7 billion in third quarter.
This was a result of the restructuring of the telecom operations (Jio) by transferring control of its key assets - fibre and towers - to two separate infrastructure trusts (InvITs) along with Rs 70,000 crore ($10 billion) of external liabilities and part of RIL's investments of Rs 36,600 crore ($5 billion).
"RIL will monetise these investments once external investors bring capital into the InvITs in the coming months. Jio as an anchor tenant will pay rentals for using these assets. In addition, RIL expects a business case beyond Jio's usage as other telecom operators and customers can also lease these assets and can participate in any such upside after the trusts service liabilities of Rs 1,07,000 crore," HSBC said.
It said investors will initially likely regard this restructuring as mainly a financing transaction to offload debt from RIL's balance sheet, considering there is limited clarity on payments by Jio as well as any revenue upside from other customers.
"We think deleveraging will remain a key theme, with more asset sales likely," it said. "Strong earnings momentum, emerging signs of a strong outlook for both the telecom and retail businesses which extend beyond this decade." Jio has transferred its 7 lakh route km of fibre and 1.75 lakh route km built and underdevelopment towers into two separate subsidiaries - one for the towers and one for the fiber assets.
Control of these subsidiaries is transferred to two separate infrastructure trusts (InvIT) which will be managed by an independent party.
RIL expects certain external investors to bring in capital into these trusts which will be further dropped down into two subsidiaries to refinance liabilities as well as pay for part of its investments into these assets, HSBC said.

Jio crosses 300 million customers mark, closes in on Airtel: Report

Telecom operator Reliance Jio has crossed the 300 million customers mark in two-and-a-half years of its operations, sources said.
The milestone was reached on March 2, they added.

Queries sent to Jio on the matter remained unanswered.
However, in its television commercials during the ongoing IPL season, Jio is shown 'Celebrating 300 million users'.
Jio became the fastest company in the world to achieve 100 million telecom subscribers in 170 days of starting commercial operation.
In its earnings report for the quarter ended December 2018, Bharti Airtel had disclosed that it had 284 million customers.
However, as per regulatory filings, Bharti Airtel reported having 340.2 million customers on its network in December and 340.3 million customers at the end of January.
Bharti Airtel crossed the 300 million customers mark in 19th year of its operations.
Vodafone Idea became the largest telecom player in the country with 400 million customers following the merger of mobile business of Vodafone India and Idea Cellular on August 31, 2018.

With spectrum deal stalled, RCom, Reliance Jio seek clarity on govt's stand

The telecom firms led by the Ambani brothers are learnt to have jointly approached the telecom ministry seeking clarification on the stand of the government over their spectrum trading deal, industry sources said on Friday.
"Reliance Jio and Reliance Communications have jointly written to the Department of Telecom seeking clarification on its stand over spectrum trading deal between the two companies," an industry source told PTI.

Another source said Mukesh Ambani-led Reliance Jio has reiterated to DoT that it is interested in going ahead with the spectrum trade with Anil Ambani's firm, Reliance Communications.
The DoT has put the spectrum trading between the two companies on hold after Reliance Jio refused to bear the burden on any past dues that RCom owes to the government.
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In a letter to the DoT on Thursday, Jio cited the petition of RCom before the telecom tribunal, TDSAT, showing that the petitioners, who are the sellers, have retained the liabilities upon themselves.
RCom, too, took the liability on itself with respect to the clearing of dues to the department.
No immediate comments were received from the Department of Telecom, Reliance Jio and Reliance Communications in this regard.
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RCom has offered the DoT corporate guarantee of Rs 1,400 crore issued by Reliance Realty Limited (RRL) and an undertaking from RRL not to alienate property for a value of Rs 1,400 crore for approving the sale of its spectrum to Reliance Jio.
Last year, RCom signed a pact with Reliance Jio for the sale of wireless spectrum, tower, fibre and media convergence nodes assets -- the proceeds of which were to be used to pare debt.
From that deal, RCom so far announced the completion of the sale of optical fibre assets worth Rs 3,000 crore and sale of its media convergence nodes worth Rs 2,000 crore to Mukesh Ambani-led Reliance Jio Infocomm.
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RCom expects to get Rs 975 crore from sale of spectrum, with which it has promised to pay the dues of Rs 550 crore to Ericsson and Rs 230 crore to settle dues of minority stakeholder Reliance Infratel.
Meanwhile, National Company Law Appellate Tribunal (NCLAT) has put on hold insolvency proceedings against RCom after the promise made by the company. NCLAT has adjourned the hearing to January 22 in the matter of Ericsson petition and RITL minority investors' related settlement petition.
Total debt on RCom is estimated to be around Rs 46,000 crore.

Jio, SBI deepen digital partnership; integrate SBI YONO app, MyJio platform

State Bank and Reliance Jio, which are partners in a payment bank venture, today extended the same to the digital payments space that will help ramp up the nation's largest lender's digital customer base multi-fold.
SBI and Jio has a joint venture for payment bank- Jio Payments Bank, wherein Jio holds 70 per cent and the balance is with SBI. But the JV is yet to operationalise despite getting the licences more than two years ago.

Under the partnership, SBI Yono, an omni channel platform offering digital banking, commerce and financial superstore services , will be enabled through the MyJio platform to customers, while MyJio, the over-the-top (OTT) mobile application, will bring in financial services capabilities of SBI and Jio Payments Bank.
"We are delighted to partner with Jio. All areas of cooperation are mutually beneficial, enhancing the digital footprint for SBI customers," SBI chairman Rajnish Kumar said in a joint statement.
Reliance Industries chairman Mukesh Ambani joined him saying, "the scale of SBI's customer base is unmatched. Jio is committed to using its network combined with retail ecosystem to accelerate digital adoption serving all all needs of customers of SBI and Jio."
Jio and SBI customers will benefit from Jio Prime, a consumer engagement and commerce platform from Reliance, which will offer exclusive deals from Reliance Retail, Jio, partner brands and merchants.
In addition, with an integration between SBI Rewardz (SBI's loyalty programme) and Jio Prime, sBI customers will be offered additional loyalty reward earning opportunities as well as broader redemption within Reliance, Jio and other online and physical partner ecosystems.