Reliance Industries Limited (RIL) Chairman and Managing Director Mukesh Ambani on August 12 held its 42nd annual general meeting (AGM) in Mumbai. Mukesh Ambani made some big announcements, including the much-awaited launch of Jio GigaFiber services from September 5. Notably, RIL shares have rallied 20% since the company held its previous AGM on August 9 last year.
Here is a list of five key points Ambani made during his speech:
1) Investment by Saudi Aramco: Saudi Aramco will invest 20% in RIL’s oil-to-chemicals division at an enterprise value of $75 billion. The deal would be India’s largest foreign direct investment (FDI), besides being the biggest foreign investment in the history of RIL. The partnership will cover all RIL’s refining and petrochemicals assets, including 51% of the petroleum retail joint venture.
2) Jio GigaFiber launch: The Jio GigaFiber will be available commercially starting September 5, 2019. Mukesh Ambani outlined that service would be broad-ranging including a 1 Gbps network speed, free landline connection, digital set-top box, ultra-high-definition entertainment, virtual content, interactive gaming and more smart home solutions. Customers will have to pay between Rs 700 and Rs 10,000 per month depending on the plan. Users will be charged only for data and voice calls would be completely free from home to any Indian mobile or fixed-line operator.
3) Listing of retail and telecom units: Mukesh Ambani announced that RIL plans to list its telecom and retail ventures in the next five years. Reliance Jio and Reliance Retail, if listed separately, would be among the top 10 companies in the country, said Ambani. Reliance Jio has already crossed 340 million subscribers. Meanwhile, RIL’s retail arm has crossed Rs 130,000 crore in revenue last year.
4) RIL to be a zero-debt company: RIL will be a net zero-debt company within the next 18 months, Ambani announced at the AGM. He said the deal with Aramco, as well as the retail petroleum deal with BP, will be closed within this financial year. That would bring in Rs 1.15 lakh crore into RIL. These, along with other transactions to deleverage the group, would make the company a zero-net debt company in 18 months. As of FY19-end, RIL had a net debt of Rs 1.54 lakh crore.
5) Reliance Jio-Microsoft partnership: Reliance Jio Infocomm has partnered with Microsoft to launch data centres across India. “Jio and Microsoft have entered into a globally unique long-term alliance to accelerate the digital transformation of our country,” said Mukesh Ambani. As part of the partnership, Microsoft will bring its Azure cloud platform into Jio’s data centres across India. The two companies will offer comprehensive technology solutions from computing and storage to connectivity and productivity to small and medium businesses in the country.
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