Reliance Jio will launch a price range laptop computer priced at $184 (15,000 Indian rupees) with an embedded 4G sim card, aiming to copy the success of its low-cost JioPhone in India’s extremely price-sensitive market, two sources informed Reuters.
The Mukesh Ambani-led conglomerate has partnered with world giants Qualcomm and Microsoft for the JioBook, with the previous powering its computing chips based mostly on know-how from Arm Ltd, and the Home windows OS maker offering help for some apps.
Jio, India’s greatest telecom service with greater than 420 million clients, didn’t instantly reply to a request for remark.
The laptop computer shall be out there to enterprise clients akin to colleges and authorities institutes from this month, with a shopper launch anticipated inside the subsequent three months, sources stated. As with the JioPhone, a 5G-enabled model will comply with.
“This shall be as massive as JioPhone,” one of many sources with direct information of the matter informed Reuters.
Since its launch late final 12 months, the handset has been India’s top-selling sub-$100 smartphone, accounting for a fifth of the market over the past three quarters, in keeping with Counterpoint.
The JioBook shall be produced domestically by contract producer Flex with Jio aiming to promote “a whole lot of hundreds” of
models by March, one of many sources stated.
Total PC shipments in India stood at 14.8 million models final 12 months, led by HP, Dell and Lenovo, in keeping with analysis agency IDC.
The launch of the JioBook will lengthen the overall addressable laptop computer market phase by at the very least 15%, Counterpoint analyst Tarun Pathak stated.
The laptop computer will run Jio’s personal JioOS working system and apps will be downloaded from the JioStore. Jio can be pitching the laptop computer as an alternative choice to tablets for out of the workplace company workers.
Jio, which raised round $22 billion from world buyers akin to KKR & Co Inc and Silver Lake in 2020, is credited with disrupting the world’s no. 2 cell market when it launched low-cost 4G knowledge plans and free voice companies in 2016, and later the 4G smartphone at a price of simply $81.