Jio Platforms' shares jump 21% in debut after $3.2 billion IPO

Jio Platforms, the telecom and digital services arm of Reliance Industries backed by Meta and Google, saw its shares rise 21% on Wednesday, opening at ₹1,358 ($14) after the company raised $3.2 billion in an IPO that attracted more than $77 billion in bids. The price increase valued Jio at roughly ₹12.5 trillion ($132 billion), making it the second-largest listed firm in India after its parent.

The offering, which ran from Oct. 21-22, was oversubscribed 22.19 times, with 13.8 million applicants, setting a record for the most-subscribed Indian stock offering. Jio entered the market in 2016 with low-cost data plans, quickly gaining customers from rivals such as Bharti Airtel, Vodafone Idea and BSNL, and now serves over 540 million customers.

"My dream is that one day, when the world counts its great technology companies, one of them will be from India, and that company will be called Jio Platforms Limited," said Akash Ambani, managing director of Jio Platforms, at the listing ceremony.

For the fiscal year ending March 2026, Jio reported profit of ₹300.5 billion ($3.2 billion) on revenue of ₹1.47 trillion ($15.5 billion), both up about 15% year-on-year. In the June quarter, revenue grew nearly 12% and profit rose 9%.

The IPO proceeds will be used to repay up to ₹275 billion ($2.9 billion) of debt at its telecom subsidiary Reliance Jio Infocomm, with the balance allocated to general corporate purposes. As of June 30, Jio's total borrowings stood at ₹613.7 billion ($6.5 billion).