RIL Chairman Mukesh Ambani shares his life's boldest bet, 'Biggest risk we took was...'

Reliance Industries (RIL) Chairman Mukesh Ambani has revealed that the "biggest risk" of his life was building telecom giant Jio as his board members expressed skepticism to his ambition.

"The biggest risk we have taken so far was Jio. At the time, it was our own money that we were investing, and I was the majority shareholder," the billionaire mentioned in an interview with McKinsey & Company.

The business tycoon admitted that his board members were doubtful about the financial viability of his telecom venture. Ambani said analysts thought India was not prepared to have advanced digital technology.

However, he moved forward with his ambition, despite pondering over the failure of the venture. The RIL Chairman said even if the investment had not delivered the expected returns, it would still be Reliance's greatest act of philanthropy, contributing to India's digital transformation.

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Ambani said that the company has always been a risk taker as scaling in business is significant.

"I told my board, in the worst case, we will not earn much return. That's okay because it's our own money. But then, as Reliance, this will be the best philanthropy that we will have ever done in India because we will have digitized India and thereby completely transformed India," Ambani told the management consulting firm.

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Mukesh Ambani launched Reliance Jio in 2016, which has now become India's largest telecom operator. In Quarter 4, the Jio platform clocked a 17.7% revenue growth and a 25.7% rise in net profit. Jio's revenue surged to Rs 30,018 crore in the January-March quarter of fiscal year 2025. The company’s 5G user base surged to 191 million, while the average revenue per user (ARPU) rose to Rs 206.20 in Q4FY25. Jio has a steadily growing footprint in 5G, cloud, and AI services.

"You start off by thinking in terms of what the worst is that could happen, and then you have to survive that. This has been one of my principles," the chairman of RIL added.