Mukesh Ambani is reportedly in talks to raise up to Rs 16,550 crore in offshore loans. As per a report by the Economic Times, India’s richest man aims to secure the funds with BNP Paribas as the lead arranger. The report suggests that Mukesh Ambani is getting the loan for Reliance Jio Infocomm which is led by his elder son Akash Ambani. The loan amount will be reportedly used to expand Jio’s 5G network in India by sourcing 5G network gear from Sweden’s Ericsson. The Ambanis led Reliance Jio Infocomm will get around Rs 16,550 crore from BNP Paribas over a nine month period during which the company will be paying back to Ericsson, BNP and a few banks. The report doesn’t clarify how much Mukesh Ambani will pay back to Ericsson, BNP and other companies involved in the mega loan deal.
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The loan for the Reliance Jio Infocomm is through a discounted process and the implicit interest rate will be arrived at over the nine-month period, the report said. This isn’t the first time Mukesh Ambani is raising money for Jio. During the annual general meeting of Reliance Industries, Ambani revealed that Jio had partnered with Swedish export credit agency EKN for a $2.2 billion funding to finance the equipment and services for 5G rollout.
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Reliance Jio 5G is now available in each of the 22 Licensed Service Areas (LSA) across each of the spectrum bands, ahead of time under the terms of the spectrum. This makes it the fastest 5G rollout of this scale in the world. With spectrum in the 700MHz, 800MHz, 1800MHz, 3300MHz and 26GHz bands Jio has the highest spectrum footprint. Jio also has 1,000 MHz in the millimetre wave band (26 GHz) in each of the 22 circles.
