A new 4G wireless data network with over 80% coverage, Reliance Jio, recently went live in India. Residents of approximately 18,000 cities and 200,000 rural villages can enjoy free cell and data plans until the end of the year. The data service then costs 149 rupees, about US$2.25, per month while cell remains free.

“No doubt Jio will create Fourth digital payments revolution in Indian semi-urban and rural population. Techies and IITians will tap this opportunity by building Blockchain/Bitcoin based applications.” - Kamesh Mupparaju, CEO of BTCXIndia

The network was rolled out by India's richest man, Mukesh Ambani, after he spent US$20 billion on 100,000 telecom towers across the subcontinent. Planning to expand the network to 90% of the population or more by March 2017, he hopes to bring 4G service to hundreds of millions of new customers, most of whom have never used the internet before.

A “major part of the rural and semi urban population are not connected with Internet due to remote locations,” Kamesh Mupparaju, the CEO of BTCXIndia, told BNC. “The advent of Jio would be the greatest boon to the rural mileau as it would connect 200000 villages with 4G wifi broadband.”

The popular bitcoin exchange CEO expects these new users to help grow bitcoin and blockchain applications, especially in the absence of banks. “The Jio 4G broadband provision enables the villagers access to peer to peer fund transfer and lending apps based on Bitcoins and Blockchain applications in spite of not getting connected to banks or any other lending institutions,” Mupparaju said.

Early Jio market tests have been extremely positive. Long lines of consumers, including A-list bollywood stars, were reported signing up for Jio service. In New Delhi on Tuesday, a public network test showed impressive download speeds around 21 megabits per second, more than fast enough to watch High Definition (HD) streaming video. Netflix HD service, for instance, suggests a connection of 5 Mbps minimum.

Competing wireless networks have already slashed prices in response to Jio’s launch. The most subscribed mobile carrier, Airtel, has cut prices for both 3G and 4G service by 80%, and second largest, Vodafone has increased the amount of data in their plans by nearly 70%.

As the world’s largest democracy, and the second most populous country on Earth behind China, India has been trailing behind much of the world in terms of data infrastructure. With a GDP of approximately US$2 trillion and an estimated population of 1.3 billion in 2014, India has only started to show growing wireless subscribers in recent years.

A February report by Swedish telecom giant Ericsson shows that mobile subscribers in India grew more than any other country in 2015. The addition of 21 million users in the fourth quarter puts the subcontinent ahead of China’s six million, and the US’s five million new users.

A June 2015 Ericsson report predicts that smartphone subscriptions are expected to surpass 750 million by 2020, up from 130 million in 2014. “The total number of mobile subscriptions in India is expected to increase to approximately 1.4 billion by 2020, resulting in a population penetration of 100 percent,” the report says. “This growth will primarily be driven by the increasing affordability of devices and services.”

On the consumer hardware side, India has also been enjoying a glut of inexpensive smartphones made to fit any budget. “Since last year, we have seen the availability of cheap smartphones,” Sandeep Goenka, Co-founder and COO of Indian bitcoin exchange Zebpay told BraveNewCoin. “We have seen these phones being used by a class of the population who could not afford them earlier.”

Specifically, the popular Freedom 251 phones have been available since February, when they made international headlines as the first smartphone for under $5. Selling for 251 rupees, or US$3.70, the android smartphone is rapidly growing and driving prices down for all competitors.

The rapid increase in users over the last year is in no small part due to cheap mobile access, according to Goenka. “We have always believed that Indians will access the Internet via mobile devices only,” he explained. “Hence we are the only mobile app based exchange. Our focus on mobile and the simplicity that mobile provides has enabled us to get 100,000 users in just 12 months.”

While mobile adoption has been surging in India, bitcoin adoption has also been growing substantially. The Indian rupee currently trades for bitcoins on several Indian exchanges, including Zebpay and BTCXIndia. There are also many ways to buy and use bitcoin at ATMs, kiosks, and over the counter.

A major bitcoin exchange in India, Unocoin, partnered with Indian Paypal equivalent MobiKwik in May to boost Bitcoin adoption across India. The partnership allows Indians a way to top up their Mobikwik wallets with bitcoin at over 75,000 retailers across the country.

Bitcoin meetups are also growing in popularity. The Indian Bitcoin meetup groups, listed on meetup.com, have over 5,800 members. In comparison, the site shows fewer than 2,000 Canadian Bitcoin meetup group members, even though Canada is one of the most bitcoin-friendly countries.

According to the World Bank's latest Global Findex database, two billion adults globally are unbanked and 21 percent of them are in India. Having the world’s largest population of unbanked, India stands to most financially benefit from the radical upgrade to their internet connectivity.

According to Zebpay’s Goenka, “This will be a game changer for all Internet products like online shopping, social media and so on. In the future, it will greatly help the Indian bitcoin industry.”

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