Reliance Jio has outlined its next phase of growth, placing artificial intelligence (AI), data, and 5G at the heart of its strategy. The telco added over six million new subscribers in the first quarter of 2025, taking its total subscriber base to 488.2 million. Average revenue per user (ARPU) rose to Rs 206.2, despite recent consumer price increases.
Jio’s 5G Network Traffic
Jio’s 5G network now handles 45 percent of its total wireless traffic, according to Reliance Industries’ latest annual report. With per capita data usage significantly higher on 5G, the company expects this figure to grow further, laying the foundation for the monetisation of next-generation services.
Also Read: Airtel, Jio, and Vodafone Idea: Data Usage Trends and ARPU Reported in Q4FY25
AI-Native Infrastructure at the Core
The key focus of Jio’s strategy is the development of AI-native infrastructure. The company aims to integrate AI across all its platforms and services, driving intelligence-led operations and experiences. Sudhir Mittal, Executive Vice President and Chief Architect at Jio Platforms, highlighted the amount of data Jio is already handling, citing a single-day consumption of 500 petabytes in the mobile application during India’s appearance in the ICC Cricket World Cup final.
Internet or Cached Data: The Internet or Just Cached Data: What Are Users Actually Using?
In an interview with Inform, he explained how the company is collaborating with TM Forum members to develop architectures that have AI and data at their centre.
Standardisation and Scalable Architecture
Mittal emphasised the need for secure and efficient data architecture, stating that AI implementation must be built on standardised frameworks to reduce inconsistency and hallucinated outputs. “Data is turning out to be a new oil,” he says. “[There is] a lot of knowledge, which can be utilised by various technical teams, business teams, marketing teams.” But its use must be architected securely and efficiently.
“The modernisation of our overall architecture is happening perpetually – every day we are improving on our architectural constructs,” says Mittal. “What we have brought to the core of our strategy is the AI implementation of componentisation and intent-based management.”
“AI is like an untamed animal,” he said. “Everybody is really going this way and that way. There are a lot of hallucinated outputs,” he explains, according to a TM Forum report dated May 28, 2025. “Even with structured data in the back, you ask the same question twice, thrice, n number of times, and you get different answers. So, you need to standardise the framework and define the guardrails and how different things need to be done.”
Also Read: TM Forum Expands ODA Canvas with Microsoft Azure Integration for Telcos
TM Forum’s Innovation Hub
According to the Mittal, Jio is playing a key role in TM Forum’s Innovation Hub in Mumbai, which focuses on embedding AI into the Open Digital Architecture (ODA). This includes developing an intent-based framework that enables AI models to interact and operate within autonomous networks. One such initiative involves integrating TM Forum’s AI Virtual Assistant (AIVA) as a standard component within ODA, alongside efforts to make all components AI-native.
Jio’s Collaboration with TM Forum
“We have brought AI implementation to the core of [TM Forum’s] strategy,” he said. “So, what we are looking for are major thought processes around componentisation and intent-based implementation. These are the core of the strategy now… AI and data are at the center of the other two themes, and everything is getting integrated through the intent-driven architectures and implementations.”
“So, a lot of futuristic architecture is being planned, which gels with what leading operators are planning in their architectures,” he adds, pointing to the participation of operators including Deutsche Telecom, Orange, Telenor and Vodafone in the Innovation Hub.
Also Read: Jio 5G FWA Stack Sees Global Interest After India Scale-Up; Jio Private 5G Powering Industry 5.0
Specifically, Mittal sees a need for business architecture integration to allow different large language models (LLMs) to interact. “There are some technologies we are working on for implementing AI-to-AI kind of interactions,” he says, adding that it’s important to continue work on TM Forum’s intent API.
Shift Toward Agentic AI
Looking ahead, Jio is working on frameworks to support agentic AI—modular systems built on smaller, open-source language models. These models would be trained on the company’s own data to deliver high performance at lower cost and carbon footprint. Mittal noted that such specialised AI agents could allow enterprises to scale GenAI applications without excessive infrastructure investment.
Also Read: Jio Showcases AI Tools, Industry 5.0 and More Innovations at IMC2024
Cost-Efficient AI for Enterprise Scale
“One of the big problems with large organisations is how do they adopt GenAI? Because the moment you are on any commercial model and as you proliferate across the organisation for different use cases, the bill – the cost – goes really out of the roof,” Mittal explains. “Now, the thought process is that we should have very, very specialised agents that can work on smaller LLM models, which are more open source, and train them with the organisation’s data and behaviour.”
With training and retraining, these agents could become quite powerful so that operators wouldn’t need a huge number of graphics processing units. “We need to come up with that kind of agentic framework in which it can scale and still remain cost effective, as well as have a lower carbon imprint,” said Mittal.
You can also join the TelecomTalk WhatsApp Community and TelecomTalk WhatsApp Channel for updates and discussions.
