Reliance Jio Stops Production of KaiOS-based JioPhone, Might Soon Launch Android Version

After launching the low-cost Android smartphones under the LYF brand, Reliance Jio came up with a new feature phone called JioPhone to lure the feature phone users. With the JioPhone, the company also introduced the KaiOS based on Firefox OS. During its announcement, Mukesh Ambani quoted the JioPhone as “India ka Smartphone.” While the JioPhone received a record 60,00,000 pre-orders in the month of August, Jio is yet to fulfill all those orders. Now, the latest report 
from FactorDaily suggests Reliance Jio to ditch the KaiOS in favor of Android OS.

The company has already stopped the production of the KaiOS-based JioPhones. While everything seems good with the JioPhone and KaiOS, the lacks of apps is what haunting the company. The JioPhone shipped before the Diwali festive season only came with Jio suite of apps. However, the demo units we have tested included apps like Facebook and Youtube. Jio already acquired more 100 million subscribers with its cheap unlimited plans and is the fastest growing startup in the world.

Since the Jio 4G network works only on 4G VoLTE supported devices, the company is yet to tap the rural areas where feature phones still dominate the mobile phone market share. On the other hand, the incumbent operators like Airtel and Vodafone are looking to acquire the first time smartphone users by the partnering with the smartphone brands. As of now, there is no word on the pricing of the new Android-powered JioPhone. We also expect the company continues its Rs 153 unlimited plan introduced specially for the JioPhone.

Talking about the Android-based feature phone, Lava has already launched the Lava 4G Connect M1 running on the forked version of Android OS called MocorDroid v6.0. Unlike the JioPhone, the Lava 4G Connect M1 also supports WhatsApp. The device is also 4G VoLTE enabled and can be used with Jio 4G SIM. Reliance Jio is yet to officially confirm this development and we are also eagerly waiting for the company’s decision over the future of current JioPhone users.