Reliance Jio-SBI tie-up: Now, watch a movie, or go shopping while banking

India’s most profitable telecom company, with the country’s largest 4G customer base, has tied up with its largest bank, paving the way for creating India’s biggest digital bank with shopping and entertainment thrown in.

While SBI has over 42 crore customers, it has just 2.5 million on its online app YONO (You Only Need One app); all of RJio’s 23 crore customers are on its MyJio app which will now be seamlessly integrated with YONO. Both SBI and RJio are already partners in the Jio Payments Bank — SBI owns 30%, RJio 70% — and the new collaboration will give RJio a leg-up in the financial services segment as well since cross-selling of products will now be possible.

The new collaboration gives SBI the ability to increase its online reach many times over while giving its customers access to Jio’s music and movie libraries, even better deals for clients shopping at Reliance Retail outlets; for RJio, its customers get access to a full-service bank and its facilities, better deals on its services, including the JioPhone.

With SBI’s YONO app getting synergised with MyJio customers having SBI account and a Jio connection, users will get a host of services and offers like reward points and special schemes to buy Jio phones, etc.

For instance, Jio Prime will offer exclusive deals from Reliance Retail, Jio, partner brands and merchants. Further, there will be an integration between SBI Rewardz, an existing loyalty programme from SBI, and Jio Prime.

Under this integration, customers of SBI will be offered additional loyalty reward earning opportunities as well as broader redemption within Reliance, Jio and other online and physical partner ecosystems.

The biggest benefit for SBI customers would be special offers for buying Jio phones. While a detailed offer has still not been worked out, instead of paying `501 at one go for the Jio phone, customers may get an offer to pay in small installments instead. This may provide a huge fillip to Jio phones which is targeted at the 500-million strong feature phone users in the country. Jio phones have already sold around 25 million and the company has now targeted 100 million in the shortest possible time.

“We are delighted to partner with Jio. All areas of cooperation are mutually beneficial, enhancing the digital footprint for SBI customers,” SBI chairman Rajnish Kumar said in a joint statement.

Reliance Industries chairman Mukesh Ambani joined him in saying “the scale of SBI’s customer base is unmatched. Jio is committed to using its network combined with retail ecosystem to accelerate digital adoption serving all needs of customers of SBI and Jio”.

If one goes by downloads, Jio has a clear lead with Jio TV’s 100 million downloads on Android store and Jio Cinema 50 million. Bharti Airtel comes next with Airtel TV having 50 million downloads and Wynk Music 85 million.

With the SBI tie-up, Jio has got an edge over Bharti Airtel in the financial app world also.