'Insurance, JioAirFiber, CBG plants craft Reliance’s roadmap for growth'

MUMBAI: Billionaire Mukesh Ambani on Monday laid out the roadmap for the next phase of growth at his $200 billion-conglomerate with a newly launched financial services unit planning to offer insurance products, telecom arm Jio providing wireless broadband services to homes and marquee investors queuing up for a pie of the retail unit.

Reliance Industries achieved consolidated revenues of Rs 9,74,864 crore in Q1FY24. The EBITDA for FY23 reached a significant Rs 1,53,920 crore, contributing to a net profit of Rs 73,670 crore. It has cumulatively invested a substantial $150 billion over the last decade. RIL will continue to invest in clean energy projects, including 100 plants to convert agri-residue - a source of pollution in the north during winter - into gas that can fuel automobiles and generate power. All this to offset emissions from its traditional fossil fuel business.

Speaking at the company’s annual shareholders’ meeting, Reliance Industries Chairman Mukesh Ambani also said his three children will join the company board as part of the succession planning.

He will continue to be company chairman for another five years beyond the current term which expires on April 19, 2024.

Already the largest retailer in the country with offerings ranging from grocery to high-end fashion, Reliance Retail is attracting “strong interest” from other top investors after it raised $1 billion from Qatar Investment Authority, he said.

The QIA investment for a 1 per cent equity stake values the retail unit for Rs 8,28,000 crore - almost double of Rs 4,28,000 crore valuation at the time of the last fund-raise in September 2020 when investors like KKR, Silver Lake and TPG took a stake.

“Several marquee global strategic and financial investors have shown strong interest in Reliance Retail,” he said without giving details.

Ambani had in 2019 stated that the group plans to list the retail business in five years.

He did not provide any guidance on the listing. On the just listed Jio Financial Services (JFS) - the fourth business of Reliance after oil-to-chemicals, telecom and retail - Ambani said Reliance has capitalised JFS with a net worth of Rs 1,20,000 crore to create one of the world’s highest capitalised financial service platforms at inception. JFS has announced a joint venture with BlackRock for mutual funds business.

It will leverage 450 million mobile phone subscribers’ base of the telecom arm, Jio to sell its products, including payment services. “JFS will enter the insurance segment to offer simple, yet smart, life, general, and health insurance products,” he said. In seven years since its launch, Jio has amassed over 450 million subscribers and per-user data consumption topped 25 GB every month. Its 5G services rollout has now covered over 96 per cent of towns and is on track to cover the entire country by December, making it the fastest-ever 5G rollout of this scale anywhere in the world, he said.

He also talked about the recently launched JioBharat, which seeks to tap into 250 million feature phone users.

At Rs 999, the 4G phone, which allows live TV streaming, playing video and music, digital photography, and even UPI payments, is priced at less than even a feature phone.

JioFiber, its optical fibre-based home broadband service, has crossed 10 million subscribers, with each consuming over 280 GB of data per month - over 10 times higher than per-capita mobile data consumption.

For places that lag last-mile connectivity, it will offer JioAirFiber - fixed-wireless broadband. “JioAirFiber will launch on the auspicious occasion of Ganesh Chaturthi on September 19,” Ambani said.

On the oil and gas business, he said the company’s joint venture with BP is on course to produce 30 million standard cubic metres per day or one-third of India’s gas production from their KG-D6 fields in the Bay of Bengal.

Reliance is investing Rs 75,000 crore in building four giga factories across 5,000 acres at its Jamnagar refinery complex in Gujarat to make solar panels, batteries for energy storage, electrolysers to produce hydrogen and fuel cells to convert it. It is also looking to establish at least 100 gigawatt (GW) of solar energy by 2030.

“We are well on our way to build the new energy ecosystem of manufacturing solar, wind, batteries, hydrogen, and bio-energy platforms,” he said.