Reliance Jio Infocomm Limited (RJIL), a subsidiary of Reliance Industries Limited has signed a deal with the South Korean giant Samsung to supply active BTS infrastructure for 4G, according to a report from DNA. Samsung would venture into base transceiver station (BTS) space for the first time and would supply BTS that facilitates wireless communication between user equipment and the network.
The report claims that RJIL has signed a $1.2 billion (Rs. 7,500 crore) deal with Samsung for 70,000 BTS pan India, and Samsung has already supplied 14,000 BTS to RJIL. Reliance would also get 4G-enabled handsets from Samsung with support for 4G voice calling facility on voice over LTE (VoLTE), the report says. Samsung is expected to supply 1,200 BTS to RJIL to launch 4G services in Guwahati 4G, where the work of laying optic fiber is already in progress, says the report.
Airtel is the first company to bring 4G in India, which is available in Kolkata, Bengaluru, Pune and Chandigarh. The company is yet to launch 4G LTE services in Delhi, Mumbai, Kerala and Haryana circles.
Reliance Jio Infocomm tied up with Reliance Communications recently to get access to the latter’s optic fiber network. It also signed Rs. 12000 crore Tower deal with RCom for 4G roll out. It received unified License for all its 22 Service Areas across India couple of months back and has already revealed their 4G launch plans, which is expected in the first half of 2014.