JioPhone is many things, but it is not a smart phone. But it sure is an intelligent mobile phone, complimented by the support of 4G VoLTE, MyJio apps and screen mirroring via JioPhone TV-Cable. Smartphones have several advantages over feature phones, but Reliance Industries (RIL) is determined to bring down the cost of hardware and data to make India a digitally-powered nation.
JioPhone is being offered for free, but to avoid any misuse of this, the company is taking Rs. 1,500 as a security deposit, which will be refunded after three years. While everything about the JioPhone is exemplary, many thought since the phone supports apps like JioCinema, JioChat and other MyJio apps, WhatsApp will also be included.
Sadly, JioPhone is not designed to support third-party apps, including WhatsApp, which has more than 200 million users in India. WhatsApp is the world's largest cross-platform instant messaging app and helps connect more than a billion users around the globe.
As it now appears, JioPhone users won't have to look further as Reliance and Facebook engineering teams have come together to work on a forked version of WhatsApp that will work exclusively on JioPhone.
"The talks are on. We already have a relationship with Facebook...There are technical challenges. A version (of WhatsApp) is needed that will work optimally on the JioPhone," a source familiar with the matter told Factor Daily.
The lack of WhatsApp support for JioPhone is due to the operating system that runs the phone. JioPhones are powered by KaiOS, which is based on Firefox OS. KaiOS is slowly gaining traction as OEMs target this newly invested area of upping their game on the feature phones.
If JioPhone gets a tailored version of WhatsApp to run on KaiOS, it won't be long before other smart feature phones running the same OS start including the popular messaging app.
Reliance Jio's target audience for JioPhone has probably never used WhatsApp. The JioPhone will serve as a sensible and affordable upgrade to feature phone users, which is still a majority in India. There are more than 50 crore feature phones in India, which gives a huge potential for Reliance Jio, and adding WhatsApp is just another reason to push its phone to users.
"Having a specialized version of Whatsapp will be a unique selling point for Jio handsets, and will help them to grow in the market as well," Neha Dharia, senior analyst with Ovum, a London-based consultancy firm, was quoted as saying by Factor Daily.
