Reliance responds to Elon Musk’s allegations, says ‘we welcome Starlink competition, even Jio awaiting satellite clearances’

New Delhi: Reliance Industries said on Friday that it welcomed competition from Elon Musk’s Starlink in India’s satellite communications market, responding to his allegations that established business interests were obstructing its launch. The company said its own Jio satellite services were also awaiting clearances and argued that every operator, Indian or foreign, must comply with the country’s laws.

In a statement addressing the controversy, the conglomerate said India’s openness to investment and innovation rested on a regulatory process applicable to all applicants. It presented the pending approvals for Jio’s satellite business as evidence that regulatory requirements extended to domestic companies as well.

“We welcome competition in satellite communications, including Starlink,” Reliance said in its statement. It added that all participants, including Jio, must serve Indian consumers while following national laws and policies.

The response followed a series of public attacks by Musk, the chief executive of SpaceX, which operates Starlink, on the obstacles facing its commercial introduction in India. He accused business interests of keeping out competition and directed personal criticism at the chairman and managing director of Reliance Industries, Mukesh Ambani, questioning his influence over the process.

Musk also challenged what he described as contradictory arguments from Ambani’s online supporters: that Starlink could not compete with Jio’s inexpensive services, yet posed a competitive threat to existing operators. His argument was that additional providers would expand consumer choice, even if competition reduced incumbents’ profits; those claims remain his characterization of the dispute.

Reliance countered by invoking Jio’s own emergence as a challenger in India’s telecom market in 2016, saying competition tested which company served customers best. According to the company, Jio had grown from having no customers at launch to serving more than 530 million a decade later.

The dispute has also drawn a government response, with the communications minister, Jyotiraditya Scindia, rejecting suggestions that India was protecting a monopoly. Speaking at the India Mobile Congress in New Delhi on October 9, he said three companies – Starlink, Jio Satellite Communications and Eutelsat OneWeb – had already secured satellite communications licences.

Crucially, receiving a telecom licence does not complete the process required to begin commercial services. Scindia said operators must individually fulfil security requirements, while the government must finalize the framework governing revenue-based spectrum charges before services can commence.

The communications ministry described the regulatory framework as fair and non-discriminatory. It said demonstrating compliance with licence security conditions was necessary to safeguard users and their data.

Scindia separately explained that security clearances came within the home ministry’s remit, placing that decision beyond the telecom licensing stage alone. His remarks distinguish the government’s position – that licensed companies still have conditions to meet – from Musk’s contention that Starlink is being prevented from entering the market.

Reliance’s interest in satellite broadband predates the current confrontation: Jio Platforms and Luxembourg-based SES announced a joint venture on February 14, 2022, to provide connectivity across India. The original agreement envisaged Jio Platforms holding 51 per cent and SES 49 per cent, combining satellite capacity with Jio’s distribution reach and ground infrastructure.

That partnership was designed to use geostationary and medium Earth orbit satellites to serve businesses, retail customers and mobile networks requiring connections to their wider infrastructure. Its stated purpose included extending Jio’s terrestrial network into places where conventional broadband coverage was inadequate.

Starlink uses a different architecture, delivering broadband through a constellation of satellites in low Earth orbit. Their proximity to Earth reduces communications delay compared with much higher geostationary satellites, supporting applications such as video calls and other interactive services.

For India, satellite broadband offers another way to connect remote communities and establishments that terrestrial networks struggle to reach, with potential benefits for education, healthcare and government services. Whether those benefits translate into wider consumer choice will depend on operators completing the remaining regulatory requirements and bringing commercially viable services to market.