New Delhi, Oct. 22 -- Reliance Jio Infocomm Ltd, India's largest telecom operator by market share, has no immediate plan to increase mobile phone tariffs, belying market expectations. It has instead chosen to grow revenue by driving users to consume more data. Jio and its closest rival Bharti Airtel Ltd recently removed their entry-level plans to bump up their average revenue per user (or Arpu, a key performance metric for telecom operators), triggering expectations that the telecom operators would increase tariffs towards the end of the year or in early 2026. "We are nudging consumers to consume more and happily pay more, but no immediate plans for the tariff (hike)," said Anshuman Thakur, head of strategy at Reliance Jio Infocomm, during an earnings call with analysts. In the September quarter, Jio's monthly Arpu rose 1.2% to Rs. 211.4 from Rs.208.8 at the end of June, with growth slowing due to promotional 5G offers, according to the company. Following Jio's decision to remove its entry-level pack, analysts had expected it to both raise tariffs and focus on premium services to close the gap with Bharti Airtel, which leads the industry in terms of Arpu (Rs.250 at the end of June). Airtel is yet to declare its September-quarter earnings. "If Reliance were not to increase tariffs in the next few months, its [year-on-year] Arpu growth for the March quarter would likely be 4% (at say Rs.214/subscriber)," J.P. Morgan analysts said in a note dated 19 October. "Investors continue to expect Jio to raise telecom tariffs ahead of the proposed IPO of Reliance Jio (likely by June 2026)." Jio net added 8.3 million mobile users during July-September, taking its subscriber base to 506.4 million. At the end of September, Jio had 234 million 5G subscribers, up from 213 million in the June quarter. 5G now accounts for 50% of Jio's total wireless traffic. When telecom operators raised tariffs in July 2024 after a gap of over two years, it was Reliance Jio that took the lead with a 12-25% price hike. But while Airtel and Vodafone Idea Ltd have been vocal about the need to hike tariffs to increase the return on capital employed (RoCE, a measure of profitability and efficiency), Jio has refrained from openly talking about increasing tariffs. "We (the industry) are operating with the lowest Arpus and the lowest rate per gigabyte. Yet you have to make money," Bharti Airtel's managing director and vice chairman Gopal Vittal said at an industry event earlier this month, adding that there was room for raising telecom tariffs. In fact, Vittal had earlier called for a change in the telecom tariff structure, by reducing data allowances on some telecom packs and charging for more data. "Though RIL (Reliance Industries) is non-committal on possible tariff hike, management indicated they have other levers like unlimited 5G slab increase, etc., to drive Arpu growth along with the accelerated roll out of FTTH (fiber-to-the-home)/FWA (fixed wireless access)," Antique Stock Broking analysts said in a note dated 19 October. Jio, during its earnings call last week, said it was looking to add more home broadband subscribers faster. It added more than 1 million new homes each month during the July-September quarter, taking its total fixed broadband connections to 23 million. Jio has set a target of 100 million home broadband customers, with no specified timeline. "The rate for connecting new homes has been increasing and the technology is working well," Thakur told analysts during the call. "A lot of these new connections are being done wirelessly, and therefore the implementation itself is simpler, faster, and we are expecting that we will be able to scale this up quite significantly from where we are today." Jio is leveraging its unlicensed band radio technology-the 5G Air Fiber and fiber route-to provide home broadband internet.In August, Reliance Industries chairman and managing director Mukesh Ambani launched Reliance Intelligence, its artificial intelligence arm, and announced expanded partnerships with shareholders Google and Meta Platforms for AI applications and services. On the role of Jio's parent, Jio Platforms Ltd, in this arrangement, Thakur said, "Jio is going to develop its own products and it is going to work with Reliance Intelligence to bring its solutions to the market."...