Facebook aims to extend products, tech built with Jio to other markets

New Delhi, April 30

Facebook’s mega Rs 43,574-crore pact with Reliance Jio will help the social media giant build products and technology that can be extended to other parts of the world, its Chief Executive Officer Mark Zuckerberg said.

He also said the social media giant aimed to create a “much better shopping and commerce experience” in India working with JioMart by leveraging WhatsApp’s communication and payments platform.

Last week, Facebook announced an investment of USD 5.7 billion (Rs 43,574 crore) in Jio Platforms.

“All the products and technology that we’re building to enable that partnership (with Jio) are going to be things that we want to do around the world. So, we’re excited about working with them to drive this vision forward and then extending it everywhere over the coming months and years,” Zuckerberg said during an investor call.

He added that the company’s strong balance sheet proved to be an “important asset” this quarter, enabling it to commit to a “long-term growth priority in India even in the midst of a troubled global economy”.

Zuckerberg pointed out that the largest Facebook and WhatsApp users in the world are in India.

“We think that there is an especially important opportunity to serve small businesses and enable commerce there over the long term. By bringing together JioMart, which is Jio’s small business initiative to connect millions of shops across India with WhatsApp, we think that we’re going to create a much better shopping and commerce experience,” said Zuckerberg.

Zuckerberg said the focus was on helping small businesses have a presence on all of the apps — Facebook, Instagram, WhatsApp, and FB Messenger — so that they can communicate organically with people and then, increasingly do things that can help them drive transactions.

“There are millions of small businesses and shops across India, and they (JioMart) want to try to help get them on to a single network that you’ll be able to communicate with through WhatsApp and do payments online through WhatsApp. So, I think that is a great, very large example of how we can wire up and help small businesses in the country where we have the largest WhatsApp community,” said Zuckerberg.

Soon after announcing the deal with Facebook, billionaire Mukesh Ambani had said Reliance Jio and the social networking giant would look to use WhatsApp for delivering goods from local neighbourhood kirana stores to consumers before expanding collaboration in education and healthcare sector.

“In the very near future, JioMart, Jio’s digital new commerce platform, and WhatsApp will empower nearly 3 crore small Indian kirana shops to digitally transact with every customer in their neighbourhood. This means all of you can order and get faster delivery of day-to-day items, from nearby local shops. At the same time, small kiranas can grow their businesses and create new employment opportunities using digital technologies,” Ambani had said.

While the deal is part of value unlocking by Reliance Industries Ltd (RIL) to cut debt, Facebook gets deeper access to India, the second-largest internet market after China.

Facebook already has over 400 million WhatsApp users in India and is looking to launch a payment offering. Having a local partner could help it in navigating various regulatory issues, including those related to privacy and local storage.

Facebook, which registered an 18 per cent rise in revenue to about USD 17.7 billion at the end of the March 2020 quarter, saw daily active users increase by 11 per cent year-over-year to 1.73 billion. Its monthly active users were up 10 per cent y-o-y to 2.60 billion at the end of March. PTI