OpenAI is in talks with Reliance Industries a few potential partnership to combine ChatGPT and different AI instruments into the latter’s companies, The Info reported. The Sam Altman-led firm is searching for to leverage Reliance’s companies, resembling wi-fi provider Jio, to distribute or promote its AI companies, presumably together with ChatGPT.
As per the report, OpenAI has thought of lowering ChatGPT’s subscription worth in India by as a lot as 85% to draw extra paid customers. At present priced at $20 per thirty days, the subscription is dear relative to India’s median wage. A possible partnership with Jio, Reliance’s telecom subsidiary, may permit ChatGPT to be bundled into cell plans at a decrease charge.
Reliance has additionally explored promoting OpenAI’s enterprise AI instruments to Indian companies by means of an API. Nonetheless, Microsoft, OpenAI’s key accomplice, holds unique rights to resell these fashions to companies, probably necessitating its involvement in any such settlement.
“Reliance is a pure ally for OpenAI in India—not merely attributable to its scale, but in addition due to its deep entrenchment throughout each the patron and enterprise landscapes,” Sanchit Vir, CEO of Greyhound Analysis, advised AIM.
He added that Reliance gives OpenAI with a ready-made gateway to hyperlocal scale and entry to India’s AI-hungry middle-class and enterprise sector. “Reliance has its fingers in each essential sector—telecom, retail, cloud, media, and authorities companies.”
He additional defined that working with Reliance will assist OpenAI navigate regulatory challenges simply.
“Navigating India’s regulatory panorama isn’t for the faint-hearted. Reliance operates a well-oiled equipment in relation to authorities relations and digital infrastructure agreements. If OpenAI aspires to scale considerably in India—instructional establishments, healthcare, rural empowerment, even governance—Reliance opens doorways that no Valley firm can,” he mentioned.
OpenAI isn’t alone on this pursuit. Meta can also be vying for a partnership with Reliance to combine its Llama open-source mannequin and Meta AI chatbot into Reliance’s digital companies.
Nonetheless, OpenAI presently leads in Indian AI adoption, with ChatGPT attracting considerably extra site visitors than Meta’s AI instruments, in accordance with analysis agency Similarweb. In the meantime, on a worldwide scale, Llama not too long ago surpassed 1 billion downloads—a pointy rise from 650 million in December 2024, marking a 153% surge in simply three months.
This, nevertheless, received’t be Meta’s first collaboration with Reliance. In 2020, the corporate invested $5.7 billion (INR 43,574 crore) in Jio Platforms Restricted, a subsidiary of Reliance Industries, making Fb its largest minority shareholder.
Why does it matter?
An excellent adoption in India hinges on each usability and affordability. The implications of excessive prices and premium pricing fashions for superior instruments are vital in a price-sensitive nation like India.
India is OpenAI’s second-largest market, however to increase its attain, the corporate should refine its pricing technique. For example, the corporate now presents ChatGPT Professional at $200/month and is rumoured to introduce plans as much as $2,000/month attributable to excessive compute prices of superior fashions, which is prohibitively costly for a lot of Indian customers.
Many customers have beforehand identified to Altman on X that, within the present state of affairs, $200 per thirty days is similar to salaries and common month-to-month incomes in lots of economies exterior the US—suggesting that AI subscription pricing can’t be uniform globally. In India, as an illustration, the common month-to-month revenue is round ₹20,000 (about $233).
In the meantime, DeepSeek is slowly altering the sport for everybody, forcing AI labs to introduce low-cost and open-source alternate options or at the least rethink their methods. “The most important revelation from DeepSeek is that open supply has received. With solely a 1% distinction in efficiency, will probably be tough for OpenAI to justify its pricing when the competitors is each free and formidable,” mentioned Kai-Fu Lee, founding father of AI startup 01.AI, in a latest interview with Bloomberg.
He added that the corporate can also be going to final infinitely as a result of its founder has sufficient cash to fund it on the present degree and has lowered computing prices by an element of 5 to 10. “With such a formidable competitor, I feel Sam Altman might be not sleeping properly,” he quipped.
Reliance Bullish on AI
Along with AI distribution, Reliance is creating an enormous information centre in Jamnagar and has mentioned providing information internet hosting companies to OpenAI and Meta. With a capability of three gigawatts, the power may present the infrastructure wanted to run AI fashions domestically, addressing considerations about information sovereignty.
In the meantime, experiences point out that OpenAI could also be constructing its personal information centre in India.
Indian authorities officers are considering mandating that international AI corporations retailer Indian consumer information inside the nation, a choice that would improve Reliance’s place in AI internet hosting.
“In our estimation at Jio, I feel AI is the most important expertise change that we’ve got seen in our lifetime until date,” mentioned Jio chairman Akash Ambani, including that AI will empower India to develop at 10% or double-digit development numbers for the foreseeable future.
He added that Reliance has already invested in its full-stack AI group, led by information scientists, researchers, and engineers, increasing it to over a thousand members. “We can have a groundbreaking thought that may convey half a billion folks [together] on one platform popping out of India, and that’s what is going to take us to [global] AI management,” Ambani mentioned at Mumbai Tech Week 2025.
Final yr, Reliance Industries unveiled consumer-focused AI initiatives, together with Jio Mind, Jio AI-Cloud, and Jio Cellphone Name AI, together with its imaginative and prescient for a nationwide AI infrastructure—difficult world cloud giants and remodeling India’s AI ecosystem.
Reliance additionally has a historical past of investments in AI corporations. In 2019, Reliance Jio acquired an 87% stake in Haptik, an AI-based conversational platform and digital assistant developer, for about ₹700 crore. Apart from, Reliance invested as much as $180 million in Embibe to accumulate a majority stake. Embibe is an AI-powered training platform.
Reliance desires to copy what it did within the telecom trade—reworking the Indian digital economic system by providing inexpensive information and connectivity, bringing tens of millions on-line, significantly in tier-2 and tier-3 cities like Patna, Jaipur, Surat, and Bhopal.
With a subscriber base exceeding 465.13 million as of 2025, Jio gives an appropriate platform to distribute AI instruments like ChatGPT to a price-sensitive but digitally curious inhabitants.
“Reliance has a confirmed file of utilizing its scale to democratise expertise. Jio’s disruptive rollout of 4G in 2016 reshaped India’s telecom market by drastically lowering cell information costs, making India the world’s most cost-effective information market. An analogous method could possibly be utilized to AI.
“By bundling ChatGPT with Jio information plans or internet hosting it on its upcoming native information infrastructure, Reliance may considerably decrease the price of AI entry,” mentioned Karn Chauhan, senior analyst at Counterpoint.
He added that not one of the operators we’ve got can consider a worldwide promise to construct, provide, and management what Jio is able to and AI will play a key function in shaping next-gen client experiences, particularly with the richness of information concerned.
At present, Reliance Jio leads the wi-fi companies market with a 40.42% share, adopted by Bharti Airtel at 33.49%. Jio’s infrastructure and low-cost information plans will make sure that OpenAI’s AI options can attain even distant areas.
The big information generated by Jio’s huge consumer base protecting searching habits, app utilization, and placement presents a chance for OpenAI to construct AI fashions that supply personalised digital assistants or instructional instruments tailored to regional languages and wishes.
Disclaimer: The headline has been up to date for readability.
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