Economic Times has reported that Xiaomi and Reliance Jio will enter into a deal just like Reliance Jio and Apple have a deal currently. In the Jio-Apple deal, the former sells Apple iPhones with bundled offers from the telco. In a similar deal, Xiaomi televisions in India may be sold by Reliance Jio with bundled offers on home broadband networks.
Reliance Jio and Xiaomi Partnership
The partnership has been reported after Xiaomi India filed requests with the regulators to enter with more products in the Indian market. It is also told that the high-level executives of Xiaomi India and Reliance Jio have met frequently in the past few weeks. They said, “Senior executives at Xiaomi India and Reliance Jio have met several times in the last few weeks.” “While the Xiaomi-Reliance relationship will start with the B2B smart point-of-sales devices whereby the latter is going to place an order for around 1 million units, both are keen to expand the relationship into consumer devices,” added the executives. This implies that Xiaomi will digitize the existing Reliance retail chain, expanding to consumer business like televisions. Reliance Jio is planning to launch home broadband services and Xiaomi televisions could be exclusively sold with bundled plans from the former. “The two also want to expand the partnership into exclusive smartphone models,” told another executive. Xiaomi recently hinted at the release of 6 to 8 new smartphones at competitive prices in India and this may be a joint venture with Reliance Jio. The JioPhone has been a success as a feature phone in India and Xiaomi could launch smartphones with bundled offers from Jio.
