Micromax to launch JioPhone competitior in first week of October

Mutiple reports in the past have suggested that Micromax is working on an affordable 4G VoLTE enabled feature phone to compete with Reliance Jio. Now According to ET (Economic Times), Micromax's feature phone will be called Bharat One 4G, and will be launched in the first week of October priced around Rs. 2,000. The launch is timed to take advantage of the festive season demand.

Micromax will collaborate with Bharat Sanchar Nigam Ltd (BSNL) to offer free voice and bundled data offers, similar to Reliance Jio. The feature phone will come with much better display, camera and battery, than current feature phones available in the market.

Micromax already sells feature phones, but the move to bring a feature phone bundled with free voice and data offers is to take on Reliance Jio's JioPhone. For comparison, JioPhone is effectively priced at Rs. 0, but you will have to pay Rs. 1,500 as security deposit, which will be refunded after three years.

There was a time when Micromax was India's number one handset marker, but now it has dropped out of the top five list due to intense competition from Chinese rivals like Xiaomi, Oppo and vivo. The domestic smartphone maker will be betting on the upcoming affordable Bharat series feature phones and smartphones to revive itself in the intensely competitive market.

Earlier this month, Micromax claimed that it sold over two million Bharat 2 smartphones by August-end, within five months of launch. Just few days back, the company launched Bharat 3 and Bharat 4 4G VoLTE enabled smartphone running Android Nougat. They are priced under Rs. 5,000, and are available for purchase via retail stores across the country.