Reliance Jio Infocomm has selected the Hughes JUPITER System to offer satellite-based connectivity to more than 400 4G sites in rural locations.
Hughes India will provide a managed service to include network planning, implementation, operation and maintenance. The company did not reveal financial details of the satellite contract with Reliance Jio.

The strategy of Reliance Jio is to expand coverage in rural and remote locations by using cost effective satellite solutions. Jio earlier said its network will soon cover 99 percent of India’s population.

Reliance Jio has already introduced cost effective 4G-capable feature phones to boost sale of its 4G SIMs in rural areas.

RIL has sold 25 million units of JioPhone by June 30, 2018. The 4G operator is targeting 100 million customers with JioPhone.

Reliance Jio has 12.2 percent share in Indian rural telecom markets as compared with 34.2 percent for Airtel, 23.3 percent for Vodafone, 23.2 percent for Idea Cellular and 7.1 percent for BSNL.

The urban market share of Reliance Jio is 24.1 percent as compared with 30.9 percent for Airtel, 16.3 percent for Vodafone, 16 percent for Idea Cellular and 12.7 percent for BSNL in India.

Reliance Jio, a company promoted by businessman Mukesh Ambani, has an all IP network, with LTE spectrum across 800MHz, 1800MHz and 2300MHz bands.

Jio’s wireless customers are consuming nearly 240 crore GB of data. Jio became world’s 1st and only Exabyte Telecom network with data transmitted over Jio’s network surpassing 100 crore GB per month.

“Hughes JUPITER System, with its high-throughput terminals and future-proof multiservice capabilities, provided the ideal performance and efficiency for supporting connectivity to our 4G/LTE sites,” said Jyotindra Thacker, group president, Reliance Jio.

The JUPITER System delivers more than 200 Mbps of TCP throughput per terminal and includes built-in 4G optimization capability that can yield 30 to 60 percent bandwidth savings versus that of standard satellite backhaul solutions.