JIOPHONE - INDIA KA SMARTPHONE

On the occasion of 40th Annual General Meeting, the owner of Reliance Jio, Mr. Mukesh Ambani announced the launch of its much awaited 4G feature phone, which is named as "JioPhone". Along with that the Telco has announced its cable TV device. Ambani, who had taken the telecom sector by surprise with free voice calls and data last year, announced the next leap at the company's 40th shareholder meeting.

Jio will offer its feature phone for a net effective price of Rs 0 ( That's right, Rupees Zero). Because, Jio will offer these phones with a refundable security deposit of Rs 1500, which will be refunded after three years upon returning the phone.

"Today, I am delighted to announce that JioPhone will be available to all Indians for an effective price of - Rs 0," said Mukesh Ambani amid thunderous applause from the shareholders. "A JioPhone user can use the JioPhone for 36 months, and can get a full refund of the security deposit of Rs 1,500 by returning the used JioPhone. Net-net, you pay nothing for the JioPhone," he added. 

The JioPhone also hosts several attractive features as listed below:

• 2.4-inch display
• Distress Call System
• Jio Music, Jio Cinema, Jio TV
• Powerful speaker
• Supports digital payment via NFC
• SD card slot for memory expansion
• Torch light
• Supports 4G VoLTE for calls and data
• New set of data plans, starting at Rs 153 for the device
• Supports 22 major languages.

Mukesh Ambani used the occasion to introduce his twin children, Akash and Isha, who presented the phone features that include calls and text messaging on voice command, Internet surfing and cable to connect the device to TV to view content, including videos.

"It is made in India by the young Indian," Esha Ambani told announcing the launch of the phone.

The phone, targeted at 50 crore feature phone users in the country, will be available for pre-booking from 24 August on payment of a refundable security deposit of Rs 1,500. "JioPhone will make the 2G feature phone obsolete," Ambani claimed, adding that the company is looking to bring 5 million phones to the market a week. The JioPhone will be available for user testing in beta mode from 15 August and for pre-booking from 24 August.

JioPhone plans

Users can either pay Rs. 153 per month, for which they will get free voice and SMS, and unlimited data (high-speed data FUP is 500MB per day), along with Jio apps. They can also choose to pay Rs. 309 per month to get all this, plus the support for mirroring your screen on a TV, via a cable that can even be plugged into CRT TVs. After three years, you can return the phone, and get a full refund on the deposit. Aside from that, the company will also have two sachet packs, at Rs. 24 for two days, or Rs. 54 per week, for users who don't want to commit to Rs. 153 as an upfront payment.