JioBlackRock Mutual Fund: New entrant in industry eyes profitable and scalable growth in India

Jio BlackRock Asset Management, one of the latest high-profile entrants into the Indian mutual fund industry, may be following a slightly different playbook from group entity Jio's disruptive telecom foray, as reported by ET Bureau.

The 50:50 joint venture between Mukesh Ambani-backed Jio Financial Services and the world's largest asset manager BlackRock, may not be as aggressive on its pricing strategy to grab market share, unlike Jio's sharp discounting that helped it catapult into the big league in telecom. Profitability and capturing share from new growth in a market that has grown threefold in five years will be some of its mantras.

"It is not at all to just capture market share, and profitability will be important and pricing is one of the key points," said Sid Swaminathan, MD and CEO, Jio Blackrock Asset Management, in an exclusive interview with ET.

The fund house is keen to offer differentiated content, value-added products and grow the market rather than grab share from existing players, he said. One of the differentiators Jio BlackRock will bring is its proprietary tech platform Aladdin, which will help in cutting transaction costs.

Jio Blackrock started operations in India this month with launch of three debt schemes that include overnight, liquid and money market funds that mopped up Rs 17,800 crore in early July. There have been talks that Reliance has also invested in the NFO.

Though the fund house has started with index funds, it aims to offer the entire range of index and active funds, funds that are driven by data, exchange traded funds (ETFs), specialised investment funds (SIFs) and alternate investment funds (AIFs) over time.