Reliance Industries today said Facebook was investing Rs 43,574 crore ($5.7 billion) in its subsidiary Jio Platforms for a 9.99 percent stake. The investment makes Facebook the largest minority shareholder in Jio Platforms and values the RIL technology arm at Rs 4.62 lakh crore ($66 billion) pre-money enterprise value.
RIL said the goal of this investment was to enable new opportunities for businesses of all sizes, especially for small businesses across the country.
The investment values Jio Platforms amongst the top 5 listed companies in India by market capitalization, within just three and a half years of launch of commercial services, Reliance Industries said in a release.
Commenting on the partnership with Facebook, Mukesh Ambani, Chairman and Managing Director, Reliance Industries, said, “All of us at Reliance are humbled by the opportunity to welcome Facebook as our long-term partner
in continuing to grow and transform the digital ecosystem of India for the benefit of all Indians. The synergy between Jio and Facebook will help realize Prime Minister Shri Narendra Modi’s ‘Digital India’ Mission with its two ambitious goals — ‘Ease of Living’ and ‘Ease of Doing Business’ – for every single category of Indian people without exception."
Simultaneously, Jio Platforms, Reliance Retail and WhatsApp have also entered into a commercial partnership agreement to further accelerate Reliance Retail’s New Commerce business on the JioMart platform using WhatsApp and to support small businesses on WhatsApp.
JioMart is being built in partnership with millions of small merchants and kirana shops to better serve the needs of Indian consumers, the Reliance statement said.
Facebook said the focus of its collaboration with Jio will be to enable new opportunities for the more than 60 million small businesses across India.
"Facebook is teaming up with Jio Platforms -- we're making a financial investment, and more than that, we're committing to work together on some major projects that will open up commerce opportunities for people across India," said Mark Zuckerberg, CEO, Facebook.
India is home to the largest communities on Facebook and WhatsApp, and a lot of talented entrepreneurs. The country is in the middle of a major digital transformation and organizations like Jio have played a big part in getting hundreds of millions of Indian people and small businesses online, he added.
"With communities around the world in lockdown, many of these entrepreneurs need digital tools they can rely on to find and communicate with customers and grow their businesses. This is something we can help with -- and that's why we're partnering with Jio to help people and businesses in India create new opportunities," Zuckerberg said.
(Disclaimer:
Reliance Industries Ltd., which also owns Jio, is the sole beneficiary of Independent Media Trust which controls Network18 Media & Investments Ltd.)