Reliance Jio Blames Major Telcos For Blocking Customers' Number Portability Requests

The battle between Reliance Jio Infocomm and Indian telecom's big three incumbents over carrying traffic across networks may appear to be subsiding, but differences over number portability and public WiFi keep the tensions still simmering in the industry. Jio has accused Bharti Airtel, Vodafone India and Idea Cellular of rejecting almost all requests by customers to port their numbers to the Jio network, and urged the sector regulator to impose financial disincentives on them.

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Calling the purported action of the incumbents a "blatant disregard" to licence conditions, it sought revocation of their licences if they continue to deny mobile number portability. The regulator "must direct the dominant incumbent operators to comply with the licence terms and obligations", Jio said in a letter dated September 14 and addressed to Trai Chairman RS Sharma.

ET has seen a copy of the letter. Bharti and Vodafone denied the charges. A Bharti spokesperson said the company was meeting all MNP requests as per guidelines while Vodafone said it allowed all requests to port to Jio. Idea didn't reply to an email seeking comment.

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The two warring sides have also taken strongly conflicting positions on Trai's discussion paper on boosting broadband penetration through low-cost WiFi in public places. Jio and the Cellular Operators Association of India (COAI), the industry body representing Airtel, Vodafone and Idea, have differed on a host of issues, including the core objectives of the WiFi technology and the need to de-licence more spectrum for WiFi services.

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The regulator last week nudged the two sides to resolve issues around points of interconnect, one of the major reasons for the tension between the two sides. Following their meeting, Bharti, Vodafone and Idea have said they would provide more points of interconnect to Jio ¡ª these are required to take calls made on one network to another. WiFi and MNP are now emerging as the next major issues that promise to keep the battle between the new entrant and the incumbents to outdo each other on.

Delaying MNP

Jio, in its latest letter to Trai, said Bharti received 83 requests, Vodafone 56 and Idea Cellular 62 for porting out to Jio. None of these has been completed yet, it alleged. Jio said the three incumbents had cited "violation of contractual obligations" for the delay in completing the shift. Other requests were rejected citing technical reasons. In its letter to Trai, Jio said according to MNP regulations, the clause of contractual obligation could be used to reject a request in only two cases. First, when a subscriber has not met with an exit clause in the case of certain specified contractual obligations of a post-paid connection bundled with a device.

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Second, if it's a corporate connection with contractual obligation having an exit clause and the subscriber has not complied with it. On the WiFi discussion paper, Jio has backed the regulator's call for citywide Wi-Fi networks to boost broadband penetration while COAI has rubbished the suggestion, saying the WiFi technology can at best be used to provision hotspots for Internet access.

" WiFi technology was conceived to provide short-range communications over an unlicensed band, which cannot be extended for providing commercial, ubiquitous citywide networks," said COAI in its submission to Trai.

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Telcos have historically viewed public WiFi as a threat to their data revenue, although they agree that it would allow them to add much-needed data capacity without buying expensive spectrum since the technology offering Internet connectivity is delivered over unlicensed, free airwaves. Since COAI's majority members, Airtel, Vodafone and Idea, do not run VoLTE networks, the industry body has said there is "no need for any regulatory intervention" and interoperability between cellular and WiFi networks must be left to market forces.

Question of interoperability

Jio, which too is a member of COAI, has urged Trai to promote interoperability between cellular/LTE and WiFi networks. Further, it has urged Trai to identify additional low-frequency WiFi bands to cover larger areas in a cost-efficient manner, while COAI feels there is no immediate need to delicense any additional spectrum for WiFi services. Jio's aggressive backing of public WiFi stems from the technology being integral to its overall 4G data strategy.

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For instance, all Jio tariff plans offer generous doses of data over a local WiFi hotspot. And to encourage folks even without a 4G phone to latch on Jio's 4G network, the company unveiled the 'JioFi' pocket-sized WiFi router. Priced at Rs 1,999, the device acts as a bridge between Jio's 4G network and the local WiFi network it creates so that even a non-4G device can connect to it.