Mukesh Ambani launches the next-gen with Reliance Jio

Along with all the note-worthy announcements of everything Reliance Jio has to offer, Mukesh Ambani brought his children Isha and Akash Ambani into the spotlight.

Ambani appreciated all the passion and hard-work the 24 year-old twins have brought to the Jio brand, along with all the other youngsters who have been part of the team. "Jio is the creation of the young, by the young and for the young. Isha and Akash are directors at Jio. They have been hands on leaders and represent the large contingent of young people at Jio," he said.

Isha Ambani graduated with double majors in psychology and South Asian studies from Yale University and has also worked as business analyst at McKinsey. While her twin Akash majored in economics at Brown University. Both the siblings were appointed directors for Reliance Retail Ventures and Reliance Jio Infocomm 2 years ago.



At an event with all the big-wigs of the telecom industry last year, Akash and Isha were the picture-perfect representatives of the Ambani family. Poised, and perfectly comfortable in the midst of old wealth, these members of the newly wealthy clan talked about the Jio brand. "We may have a few thousand working round the clock, but Jio is evolving every single day...It's not just about mobility but bringing it together with digital, media, cloud services among many other things," Akash said.

At Jio's biggest campus, a sprawling cluster of glass buildings, manicured lawns and giant Jio logos outside Mumbai, the scale of Ambani's vision is evident.



The campus has 15,000 employees working for Jio alone, plus hundreds of consultants and service providers working alongside the group. There are large guest houses and hotels.

In a single hall, Reliance has put on show everything from its e-payment mechanism and music-streaming app to its messaging app, sleek Jio smartphones - sold at a fraction of the cost of an iPhone - connected cars, and even a replica home.

"As they go out, they will have a very aggressive posture," said Rajan Mathews, director general of the Cellular Operators Association of India.

Apart from Ambani and Akash, Manoj Modi, a long-serving adviser and a reminder of the influence of trusted employees, was instrumental in Jio's launch.

One company insider said the Jio logo is actually a mirror image of the word 'oil,' reflecting in a way Reliance's journey from oil drilling to data mining.

This is perhaps one of the very few companies that can boast of a young staff, with Ambani saying that the average age of the management team being 30. With Mukesh Ambani setting the target of acquiring 100 million customers in the 'quickest time possible', it will be interesting to see whether this set of youngsters can deliver on promises, and compete with the likes of established players like Airtel, Idea and Vodafone.