Reliance Jio signs tower sharing deal with Ascend Telecom

RJIL, telecom arm of Reliance Industries Ltd, today signed a pact with mobile tower company Ascend Telecom Infrastructure for building the 4G network.
"Our partnership with Ascend Telecom is a continuation of our efforts to forge strategic partnership with key tower infrastructure companies to build a formidable nationwide network," Reliance Jio Infocomm Ltd Managing Director Sanjay Mashruwala said in a statement.
Ascend has over 4,500 mobile towers across the country.
"We are excited about the opportunity to partner with RJIL for launch of their 4G services," Ascend Telecom's Director and CEO Sushil Kumar Chaturvedi said.
The company is backed by investor firms New Silk Route Growth Capital, IL&FS and the TVS Group.

With this agreement, total available towers for RJIL to roll out its network would reach about 1,92,500. The company already has an agreement with Bharti Airtel, Reliance Communications, Viom Network, American Tower Company to utilise their infrastructure.

As per the deal with Bharti Airtel, RJIL will have access to about 82,000 mobile towers, while the agreement with RCom deal will provide it access to about 45,000 towers. The recent deal with Viom Networks and ATC gives it access to 42,000 and 11,000 mobile towers.
RJIL had also signed agreement with Tower Vision last month to access its about 8,400 mobile towers. It is expected to launch 4G services in July-September quarter.

RJIL holds pan-India broadband wireless access spectrum that can be used for 4G services. Besides, it won radiowaves in the 1800 Mhz band, widely known as 2G spectrum, which is also being used for 4G services worldwide.
The company will use both available 4G technologies to provide services.
RJIL is the first telecom operator in the country to get a unified licence for all 22 service areas in India. The unified licence, which it received in October, will allow RJIL to offer all telecom services, including voice telephony.