Mukesh Ambani- led Reliance Jio said that it is nearing the completion of 850 Mhz band deployment across 18 circles in the country, and its network is live in 18000 cities and more than 2 lakh villages in 2300 and 1800 MHz bands. Jio’s all-IP network is almost optimised after the Band 5 or 850 MHz integration. At the time of the recent quarterly results announcement, the company said that deployment and optimization of 850 Mhz band in these circles will take 6-8 weeks.

The integration of 850 Mhz band has helped them to reach smaller villages and fill the black spots of their 4G network. Overall, Jio’s coverage improved a lot after 850 MHz integration. Reliance said that Jio has already achieved 100% core network availability, and the network is capable of seamless inter-band handovers with call or data session contiguity. Also, Jio has also started carrier aggregation trials across various frequencies to deliver much higher data speeds and increase the overall capacity of their network.

According to the recent investor presentation, the 4G entrant received 850 MHz band frequency allocation in balance 4 circles–Karnataka, Tamil Nadu, Kerala, Rajasthan–on July 6, 2016. While the company has not shared an exact date for the commercial roll-out, but a number of media reports suggest that it is indeed planning to open its network commercially for everyone on Independence day with the launch of the maiden plan—Freedom, which will offer free voice service, besides giving data benefits to customers.

Jio has 846.10 MHz of the liberalised spectrum, which is almost 25% of the total spectrum available across all commercial bands deployed in India. For the exact amount of liberalised spectrum held by the operator in each band in each circle you can refer our spectrum holding chart 2016. The company has said that the entire spectrum repository would be deployed in creating LTE networks and not in legacy networks.

Unlike current telecom operators, Jio has already built a complete digital ecosystem of apps and content. It is also looking to provide FTTH and Wi-Fi services for users under the Jio brand. Earlier, we reported that Jio has in fact started importing IPTV set top box for offering Jio TV to customers soon.

As per our initial test, along with feedback from TT users, we have found out that Jio’s band 5 or 850 Mhz network is delivering 3 – 14 Mbps of speed. In addition, voice service through VoLTE has also improved after the 850 MHz integration. We have also noticed that the network switches to different band very smoothly even during a call or data session without any interruption.

Jio is also expected to launch MNP port in facility for new customers soon, might launch postpaid plans with 5-10 times more data & free voice calls: Sources