Airtel partners Flipkart, MakeMyTrip, Netflix to counter Jio

Airtel partners Flipkart, MakeMyTrip, Netflix to counter Jio

Flipkart will offer cash backs in the form of coupon recharges on buying a smartphone.

Airtel

MUMBAI: Indian global telecommunications company Bharti Airtel is teaming up with Flipkart, MakeMyTrip and Netflix to provide customised offers for its consumers, in a bid to compete with Reliance Jio.

Reliance Jio, having experienced a huge growth over time, used the same strategy to attract customers. Airtel will also attempt to expand itself into a digital platform to attract more customers.

According to a report by The Economic Times, the offer will be harboured under the #AirtelThanks privilege membership programme. Subscribers who contribute a monthly revenue of over Rs 100 on an average can enjoy the benefits of the offer. On the principle, higher the recharge, bigger the offer value.

Flipkart will offer cash backs in the form of coupon recharges on buying a smartphone from the ecommerce platform.

The idea is to make sure a subscriber stays with the firm. “We studied telcos across the globe including T Mobile and Telstra for this,” said Bharti Airtel CMO Vani Venkatesh.

Speaking to ET, Jaideep Ghosh, partner at consultancy firm KPMG explained how Reliance Jio’s services have demanded other telcos to rise a step up further. Explaining that, he said, “In the currently competitive landscape, traditional sources of plain vanilla telecom services and data services are facing intense pressure and telcos need to branch out into other services, Carriers need to get into partnerships to achieve this, which is crucial to their future growth.”

Concluding this, Sameer Batra, CEO - content and apps, at Bharti Airtel said, “The more you are invested in the brand, the higher differentiated products and more options thrown to you”.