Within 24 hours of Airtel’s announcement of offering 4G internet at the rates of 3G, Reliance has offered unlimited mobile Internet for only Rs 999 per month with no download limit.
This disruptive offer, has signaled another round of data tariff war within the Indian telecom industry.
This new data plan from Reliance would be initially rolled out in Chennai, Bengaluru, Hyderabad and Pune effective November 27, 2014. Other major cities such as Mumbai, Delhi and Kolkata will also be covered under this plan very soon. Customer of Reliance CDMA network can opt for this plan. Previously the Reliance CDMA offered a download speed of 3.1 mbps, however, with it upgraded pro 3 network, customers can get speeds of upto 14.7 mbps!
Gurdeep Singh, chief executive (consumer business) at Reliance Communication has categorically stated that this is not a promotional, attention grabbing plan with terms and conditions in between. The user who has opted for this unlimited mobile internet plan can download “100 GBs for Rs 999 without fear of a bill shock at the end of the month”.
He said that this plan “was not a promotional offer in disguise to grab data customers in key markets. We are here for the long haul and plan to extend this offer nationally in all key markets.”
Singh further said that this new attractive plan was mainly targeted for those, who are “dissatisfied with their current data speeds or the quality of indoor coverage.”
Specialists are speculating that Reliance is ramping up it’s customer’s base ahead of the much-acclaimed 4G Internet launch next year. Initially, they are targeting all the heavy mobile Internet users, and there can’t be any better bait than offering unlimited internet for Rs 999.
Yesterday, Airtel had stirred the market with it’s offer of 10 GB 4G Internet plan for Rs 999, which is 33% cheaper than 10 GB 3G Internet plan which is offered for Rs 1499. Reliance’s counter attack within 24 hours has converted this buzz into a hailstorm.
Besides Airtel, this new CDMA plan from Reliance is also directly competing against Sistema Shyam Teleservices’ Rs 999 data plan, in which users can get 40GB and 20GB limits for postpaid and prepaid customers respectively.
The market is now closely watching the moves of other major mobile Internet players such as Vodafone India, Idea Cellular and Sistema Shyam who are expected to announce some major plans, which can match Reliance’s and Airtel’s sizzling offers.
Is It Really Possible?
Telecom experts have stated that offering unlimited data plan for Rs 999 is technically impossible, with the existing infrastructure. As several customers will try to access the same bandwidth at the same peak time, the network and servers will choke, creating unpleasant experiences for all the customers.
A top telecom expert, on conditions of anonymity, told ET: “Since a data pipe’s capacity is finite, a large group of customers collectively opting for such an unlimited offer are bound to experience a serious loss of speed at some point, especially since DoT allows operators to downgrade data download speeds as part of its fair usage and trade policy once a customer is seen to be abusing a data plan,”
Performance of Reliance’s Internet (on mobile or data card) is infamous for it’s slow speed during peak hours (7 PM to 10 PM) in various circles. It would be really interesting to observe how Reliance maintains high speed, along with offering 100s of GBs of download for thousands of customers at a flat price.
We will keep you posted.