Indication of thaw in Ambani-Mittal feud
AIRTEL IS LOCKED IN A FIERCE TURF WAR WITH JIO WHICH HAS SOUGHT TO DISRUPT THE MARKET LEADER’S DOMINANCE
NEW DELHI: They met, they greeted each other as if they were long-lost friends, they smiled for the cameras. Were these the chairmen of two companies engaged in a no-holds barred fight over the last year?
On stage together for the first India Mobile Congress, Mukesh Ambani, chairman of Reliance Industries Ltd-owned Jio and Sunil Mittal, chairman of Bharti Airtel Ltd, temporarily dropped their adversarial stance for a rare show of camaraderie, calling each other “friends” and vowing to collaborate and promote technologies such as artificial intelligence, robotics, internet of things and cloud computing, technologies which Ambani called “enablers of a new wave of wealth and employment for all”.
Forgotten briefly was the battle of the two giants dating back to 2002 when Ambani launched Reliance Infocomm in competition with Airtel. The two firms resumed hostilities last year after a 10-year hiatus. On Wednesday, Ambani said: “We have to invest in building nextgeneration technology assets... And we must break silos and forge partnerships... Together, we can achieve the unimaginable.” It was a significant statement since it came after a closed-door meeting with Mittal and telecom minister Manoj Sinha.
Mittal was equally pacifist: “As Mukesh pointed out, none of us can do it alone. We will all have to come together for the benefits of customers. We have to collaborate ourselves, create an ecosystem, use common towers, hopefully common fibres...We will need to combine the forces with the government. I hope, together with friends like Mukesh, we will build something for the future.”
Airtel is locked in a fierce turf war with Jio, which has sought to disrupt the market leader’s dominance through a series of ultra-cheap services and, now, affordable handsets.
The companies have also sparred over the so-called IUC or interconnect usage charges levied by a telco for terminating a call from another telco (the second firm pays).
Last week, the telecom regulator cut the charge in a move that benefits Jio and disadvantages older telcos such as Airtel. Jio has also argued against a bailout package for telcos that is being considered by the government.