Reliance Jio Surpasses Bharti Airtel With Over 90 Percent Broadband Subscribers
In Q3FY25, Reliance Jio added about two million home broadband customers, bringing its total to 17 million, roughly 90 percent more than rival Bharti Airtel, according to brokerage CLSA, thanks to its 5G fixed wireless access (FWA) service.
The combined market share of the two telecom companies in the home broadband space is 60 percent.
5G FWA is largely responsible for the sector's growth, as Jio AirFiber and Airtel Xstream AirFiber both attract customers.
Rather than using conventional wired infrastructure like fiber or cable, FWA uses wireless signals to deliver high-speed internet.
Signals from neighboring mobile towers are picked up by specialized customer premises equipment (CPE), such as an interior router or a fixed outside antenna, and transformed into Ethernet or Wi-Fi.
The number of Jio's 5G FWA subscribers increased to 4.5 million in Q3, making up 85 percent of total home broadband additions, according to CLSA.
About 70 percent of new 5G FWA subscribers are coming from cities outside of the top 1,000, which is encouraging for the telco.
According to Jio, it is on course to overtake all other 5G FWA operators worldwide.
The home broadband market can quadruple to 80-90 million users in the medium term, according to Airtel, which is in negotiations with Tata Play for a possible transaction.
High-speed broadband networks that are directly connected to residences via optical fiber cables are referred to as FTTH.
"With the duo targeting 5G FWA ramp-up alongside Fibre to the Home (FTTH) and bundled pay-TV offerings, these services could be an $11-15 billion annual revenue opportunity on top of India’s mobile revenue growing 30 per cent to $39 billion by FY27," CLSA said.
In India, mobile broadband penetration is 79 percent, with 900 million 4G and 5G users out of a total of 1.14 billion users. However, just 46 million households—or 15 percent of the total of over 300 million households—have broadband access, including 5G FWA.
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"We believe the best is ahead for Jio’s and Airtel’s home broadband business, where growth is now accelerating, driven by fast-paced adoption of 5G FWA alongside the evolving content consumption preferences of households," CLSA said.