Indian full-service provider Reliance Jio Infocomm (Jio) has launched its ‘JioAirFiber’ service, a 5G-based fixed wireless broadband offering. 

The service was initially made available in eight cities – Ahmedabad, Bengaluru, Chennai, Delhi, Hyderabad, Kolkata, Mumbai and Pune – but the company is planning to expand coverage rapidly. 

Prior to the launch, Jio officials had explained that the deployment of last-mile fibre infrastructure was an important but ‘painstaking process’ and that by utilising 5G technology it could quickly provide coverage to the ‘millions of potential customers without home broadband due to complexities and delays in extending optical fibre to their premises’. 

Jio’s ‘AirFiber’ and ‘AirFiber Max’ plans offer broadband connectivity with download speeds of between 30Mbps and 1Gbps and are priced from INR599 (USD7.2) per month to INR3,999. The plans also include a digital TV service with 550 channels, plus access to a range of streaming services and applications.