Though Jio has been in the limelight of technology media from the very first, we were actually given information by Jio only as much as they wanted us to know. Still there is no update about Jio’s voice policy – is it VOLTE or VoIP or a fall back to Reliance Communications’ 2G network?
Jio wants to be more than just a data service provider; rather they have pushed their fiber plan to reach millions of Indians’ homes. They have laid some, borrowed from others and have become a part of international submarine cable (Bay of Bengal Gateway).
Without voice or being a ‘dumb pipe’ model is nothing new. Rather, before LTE went mainstream, there were some WIMAX players who relied upon data- only model. Some succeeded, some did not – but everyone moved to LTE eventually.
Let us take a look at how LTE has changed the scenario in Africa and Indonesia.
In Africa, there has been a recent surge in telecom investment, and a lot is coming in the form of LTE deployment. There are several players who earlier rolled out WiMAX, and are now offering LTE.
A List of Africa’s data- only LTE operators: