Reliance Jio Infocomm, the broadband subsidiary of Mukesh Ambani-led Reliance Industries Ltd. (RIL), on Tuesday, signed an indefeasible right to use (IRU) agreement with Bharti Airtel to use the latter’s i2i submarine cable for its 4G service for an unspecified amount.
Bharti’s i2i connects India to Singapore, and the cable consists of eight fibre pairs using DWDM (dense wavelength division multiplexing), capable of supporting multiple terabits of capacity per fibre pair. Its landing points are in Chennai and Tuas in Singapore.
Reliance Jio, which is gearing up to launch 4G services, will utilise a dedicated fibre pair on i2i.
“The high speed link will enable Reliance Jio to extend its network and service reach to customers across the Asia Pacific region. It will connect Reliance Jio directly to the world’s major business hubs and ISPs, thereby, helping in meeting the bandwidth demand and provide ultra-fast data experience to customers,” RIL said in a statement.
Earlier this month, Reliance Jio had entered into an agreement with Anil Ambani-controlled Reliance Communications (RCom) to use RCom’s optic fibre network for a total payment of Rs.1,200 crore.
Earlier, it was speculated that Reliance Jio would outsource much of its infrastructure requirement from RCom.
Reliance Jio, by tying up with multiple carriers and service providers, is adopting a cost saving strategy to rapidly grow and expand its international and domestic networks.
“Bharti and Reliance Jio will continue to build on this strategic framework and consider other mutual areas of cooperation and development to leverage their respective assets towards offering their customers a much richer experience,” the RIL statement added.
Bharti’s global network runs across 225,000 Rkm, covering 50 countries and 5 continents. It also has terrestrial express connectivity to neighbouring countries.
