Mukesh Ambani is not done – Jio Fiber to get over $1 billion as Abu Dhabi and Saudi sovereign funds are set to invest in Reliance InvIT

• Reliance InvIT is set to raise funds of over a billion dollars from Saudi Arabia’s sovereign fund – Public Investment Fund and Abu Dhabi Investment Authority.
• Brookfield Infrastructure Partners has already invested ₹25,215 crore in the Tower InvIT.
• Jio already has 175,000 towers and 1.1 million route kilometers for fiber, with one million home users.

Reliance Jio has raised $15.6 billion since April and now, Mukesh Ambani has plans for more. Reliance InvIT is set to raise funds of over a billion dollars from Saudi Arabia’s sovereign fund – Public Investment Fund and Abu Dhabi Investment Authority, Abu Dhabi royal family’s fund, a source told Business Insider.

Brookfield Infrastructure Partners has already invested ₹25,215 crore in the Tower InvIT. “Discussions with potential investors for Fiber InvIT are in progress,” Reliance had said in its annual report. Reliance has not yet responded to Business Insider's emails.

This would be the second investment from the sovereign funds into Reliance. Earlier, Saudi PIF had invested $1.5 billion in Jio Platforms for 2.32% stake, while ADIA had invested $756 million for a 1.16% stake. Recently, the Indian tax authority had announced a complete tax exemption for sovereign funds investing in Indian infrastructure.


The promise of fiber

Jio Fiber was launched in 2018 and already has 175,000 towers and 1.1 million route kilometers for fiber, with one million home users. In its annual report Reliance said that Jio’s Fiber to the Home services has the potential to connect 50 million homes and 15 million enterprises with high-speed fiber across 1600 cities.

“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. Jio’s extensive intracity fiber network, last-mile execution, seamless customer experience along with attractive bundling of digital content and smart home IoT solutions would be key differentiators,” said the report.

In its next phase, Jio plans to offer state-of-the-art wireline services, which are all 5G ready while also promising to have an ‘efficient pricing’. Currently, Jio Fiber has monthly plans starting from ₹699, which go up to ₹8,499.

“A Jio is not just a telecom player, they are expanding like anything, the next big wave will be Jio fiber. Honestly, the kind of demand they are getting right now, they are not being able to apply. And there are multiple reasons for the Jio fiber demand, it will be a gamechanger in the broadband space and will hurt a lot of people. There will be an impact on the DTH players as well when Jio will bundle cable and internet services,” Karan Chechi, director at TechSci research had earlier told Business Insider.

SEE ALSO:

Intel will speed up Mukesh Ambani’s 5G run, power him with AI and possibly a Jio laptop⁠— all in return for massive amount of data

TCS to kickstart lateral hiring and bring back 5% of its employees to offices