Incumbent operators Bharti Airtel, Vodafone and Idea cellular have reasons to worry. Reliance Jio is set to launch its 4G services with the largest network of 300,000 towers, thanks to its strategy of going for infrastructure sharing.
 
It has already signed agreement for leasing towers with various telcos and tower companies. It will use 45,000 towers of Anil Ambani-owned Reliance Communications (RCOM); 82,000 towers of Bharti Airtel & Bharti Infratel; and 42,000 towers of Viom Networks, a joint venture between Tata group and SREI.
 
It will also deploy around 50,000 ultra-low cost base stations to roll out its 4G services.
 
Sources told Telecomtiger that the company is also likely to sign agreement with the government-owned Bharat Sanchar Nigam Ltd (BSNL) for leasing its 62,000 towers. The PSU is waiting for the cabinet nod for allowing it to share its towers with private players.

    
 
If one adds all of them, then the number of towers comes out to be 300,000!
 
RCOM                                                45,000
Bharti Infratel                                     36,000
Bharti Airtel                                        46,000
Viom   Network                                  42,000
Reliance Jio                                         50,000
BSNL                                                  62,000
 
 
Reliance Jio will be leading the pack in terms of its size of network. India’s largets telecom player Bharti Airtel (combined with Indus and Bharti Infratel) has about 135,000 towers; whereas Vodafone has around 125,000 towers.
 
Reliance Jio is presently doing trials of its 4G network in Delhi, Mumbai and Jamnagar of Gujarat. Once the trial is completed Reliance Jio is likely to offer services somewhere in September 2014. Reliance has both 2300 and 1800 Mhz spectrum to roll out services.