Reliance Jio to enter India's e-commerce segment to take on Amazon, Walmart

Reliance Industries is planning to set up a new e-commerce platform in India. The initiative will be taken care of by their telecom arm Reliance Jio and retail arm Reliance Retail. The announcement was made by none other than Mukesh Ambani, Chairman and Managing Director of Reliance Industries, which will also invest Rs 3-lakh crore in Gujarat in the next 10 years. Ambani was speaking at the ongoing Vibrant Gujarat Summit in Gandhinagar.

What's next?

Reliance Industries' well-established offline retail arm Reliance Retail has emerged strongly with their grocery delivery business in the last few years, something Walmart-owned Flipkart and Amazon have not been able to achieve. Now, the upcoming joint venture between Reliance Retail and Reliance Jio can be seen as a new challenge for competitors. After the announcement, Reliance Industries' stock prices have significantly increased.

At the time of writing this, we have limited information on how this whole e-commerce strategy will play out for India's richest man, who according to Forbes has a net worth $46.7 billion.

Also Read | Reliance to invest Rs 3 lakh crore in Gujarat in next 10 years: Mukesh Ambani

In October, Ambani had said that India should be prepared to embrace 5G by 2020. So obviously, Reliance Jio is expected to play an important role in the transition from 4G to 5G. To recall, Reliance Jio disrupted India's telecom segment with the introduction of its calling and data services back in 2016.

In December, the Indian government imposed new restrictions on e-commerce companies like Amazon and Flipkart to prevent them from selling products supplied by their affiliated companies, in addition to offering their users exclusive discounts and products. All these new guidelines and policies will go into effect February 01, 2019, ahead of General Elections.