Google has entered into a partnership with Reliance Industries, India's largest company by market capitalization, to offer its AI Pro subscription free for 18 months to eligible Jio 5G users. The initiative aims to broaden Google's artificial intelligence footprint across India, a key emerging market for technological expansion.
Announced on Thursday, the collaboration provides access to Google's Gemini 2.5 Pro model via the Gemini app. The bundled offer includes increased limits for generating AI images and videos with Nano Banana and Veo 3.1, expanded use of Notebook LM for research, and 2 terabytes of cloud storage across Google Photos, Gmail, Drive, and WhatsApp backups. The offer, valued at approximately ₹35,100 ($396) over 18 months, will initially target Jio users aged 18 to 25 before a nationwide rollout to all Jio subscribers, according to statements from both companies. Google's AI Pro plan typically costs ₹1,950 (around $22) per month in India.
Beyond the consumer offering, Reliance's AI subsidiary, Reliance Intelligence, will become a strategic go-to-market partner for Google Cloud. This component of the partnership focuses on expanding Gemini Enterprise access across Indian organizations and developing pre-built AI agents for the platform. It also includes efforts to broaden access to Google's Tensor Processing Units (TPUs) in the country.
Sundar Pichai, CEO of Google and Alphabet, stated in a prepared statement, "Today's announcement will put Google's cutting-edge AI tools in the hands of consumers, businesses, and India's vibrant developer community." Mukesh Ambani, Chairman and Managing Director of Reliance Industries, added, "Through our collaboration with strategic and long-term partners like Google, we aim to make India not just AI-enabled but AI-empowered – where every citizen and enterprise can harness intelligent tools to create, innovate and grow."
The move follows a similar strategic alignment three months prior when Perplexity partnered with Bharti Airtel, India's second-largest telecom operator, to provide free access to Perplexity Pro for its 360 million subscribers. Earlier this week, Google rival OpenAI also announced plans to offer free access to its sub-$5 ChatGPT Go plan to all users in India starting November 4. India, with over a billion internet users, is increasingly viewed by global tech firms as a critical frontier for gathering diverse data, refining AI models, and testing use cases for broader application in other emerging markets.
