How Working with Competitors Made Jio a Telecom Giant

What other companies can learn from its success.

by

and

Mani Venkatesh

by

and

Mani Venkatesh

December 20, 2021

NurPhoto/Getty Images

Summary.

Jio Platforms’ unique experiment of co-opetition with global tech giants combined with its local prowess allows it to address an enormous market of price-sensitive customers. Thanks to its sheer scale, innovation, and unique collaborations, it can offer integrated solutions for retail, grocery, fintech, medical, agricultural, e-commerce, and e-payment needs, in addition to telecom services and home entertainment — at affordable prices. The resulting knowledge, access, business possibilities, and even entertainment opportunities could transform the lives of over one billion people in India. In this article, the authors unpack why Jio has been so successful and what lessons we can learn from its evolution.

More than a traditional telecom business, India’s Jio Platforms is proving to be a disruptor. Jio was launched as a “freemium” service, offering free internet services to price-sensitive Indian customers to increase the adoption rate and scale up the market. Previously, Indian customers, whose average income is about $150 per month, had never had access to such a high-speed internet — bundled with so many apps and digital solutions — at such low prices.

New!

HBR Learning

Global Collaboration Course

Accelerate your career with Harvard ManageMentor®. HBR Learning’s online leadership training helps you hone your skills with courses like Global Collaboration. Earn badges to share on LinkedIn and your resume. Access more than 40 courses trusted by Fortune 500 companies.

Learn how to overcome barriers when working globally.

Start Course

Learn More & See All Courses

Vijay Govindarajan is the Coxe Distinguished Professor at Dartmouth College’s Tuck School of Business, an executive fellow at Harvard Business School, and faculty partner at the Silicon Valley incubator Mach 49. He is a New York Times and Wall Street Journal bestselling author. His latest book is Fusion Strategy: How Real-Time Data and AI Will Power the Industrial Future . His Harvard Business Review articles “Engineering Reverse Innovations” and “Stop the Innovation Wars” won McKinsey Awards for best article published in HBR. His HBR articles “How GE Is Disrupting Itself” and “The CEO’s Role in Business Model Reinvention” are HBR all-time top-50 bestsellers. Follow him on LinkedIn.
vgovindarajan
Anup Srivastava holds Canada Research Chair in Accounting, Decision Making, and Capital Markets and is a full professor at Haskayne School of Business, University of Calgary. In a series of HBR articles, he examines the management implications of digital disruption. He specializes in the valuation and financial reporting challenges of digital companies. Follow Anup on LinkedIn.
Mani Venkatesh is the head of the MSc in big data and AI program and is an associate professor in the department of strategy and entrepreneurship at Montpellier Business School (MBS) in France. He possesses over 22 years of academic and industrial experience and served in Fortune 500 companies in various senior management roles for over a decade. His research entails digital transformation strategies and sustainability of new-age enterprises. Follow Mani on LinkedIn.

New!

HBR Learning

Global Collaboration Course

Accelerate your career with Harvard ManageMentor®. HBR Learning’s online leadership training helps you hone your skills with courses like Global Collaboration. Earn badges to share on LinkedIn and your resume. Access more than 40 courses trusted by Fortune 500 companies.

Learn how to overcome barriers when working globally.

Start Course

Learn More & See All Courses

How Working with Competitors Made Jio a Telecom Giant

Partner Center

Explore HBR

HBR Store

About HBR

Manage My Account

Follow HBR