Anil takes brother’s help on 4G

Offer 4G services using Mukesh’s Jio; RCom-Aircel merger soon

New Delhi, June 23: Anil Ambani-led Reliance Communications (RCom) will start offering 4G service using Anil’s elder brother Mukesh Ambani’s Reliance Jio network to its CDMA customers from next week onwards in select circles.

“RCom has written to the department of telecom, informing (the department) that it will be using Reliance Jio Infocomm 4G network to provide 4G data service to its CDMA customers from next week. Only those CDMA customers who opted for the upgrade will get the service,” an official source told PTI.

Of the 80 lakh RCom’s CDMA customers, over 90 per cent have opted for the offered upgrade to 4G services, the data shared by the company with DoT showed.

According to the letter to DoT, RCom will launch 4G data service in 12 circles — Mumbai, Delhi, Kolkata, Gujarat, Andhra Pradesh, Maharashtra, Punjab, UP East and West, Odisha, Madhya Pradesh and Bihar. By mid-July, the company will expand service to six more circles — Tamil Nadu, Kerala, Karnataka and Rajasthan — but only after DoT’s approval.

The company has plans to offer 4G service using Reliance Jio data network on a pan-India basis by mid-August.

Meanwhile, an announcement on the merger between RCom and Aircel is expected very shortly after the signing of a “binding definitive” pact.

“RCom and Maxis Communications Berhad and Sindya Securities and Investments Pvt Ltd (Sindya), the shareholders of Aircel Ltd (Aircel), expect to sign binding definitive documentation and announce the proposed transaction for the combination of the wireless business of RCom and Aircel very shortly,” the RCom said. — PTI