Reliance is India's answer to Exxon, AT&T, Amazon

New Delhi: Billionaire Mukesh Ambani's Reliance Industries is India's answer to US giants Exxon, AT&T and Amazon - all rolled into one, Bernstein Research said on Tuesday.

"Reliance has disrupted the energy and telecoms industry in India and is on the cusp of doing the same to retail, fintech, and media," it said in a report adding the company has an enviable track record of innovation and execution.

For the oil-to-telecom conglomerate, energy remains core business and is expected to further expand as India is forecast to be the fastest-growing market for fuel and chemical products over the next decade, it said adding the company's partnership with BP of the UK and Saudi Aramco will support this.

Reliance owns the world's largest single-site oil refining complex and has multiple petrochemical plants. Three years back it forayed into telecom business and has reached 34 per cent share of market revenue. "Based on the current net add run-rates it will likely reach 44 per cent share by the end of the next financial year," Bernstein said. On its retail foray, it said Reliance is the offline leader with $18.5 billion of revenues coming from 11,000-plus stores. "The company is best positioned in New Commerce - digitising the neighbourhood stores and in e-commerce (grocery/fashion categories)."

Also, fintech is another area in which Reliance is well positioned, it said identifying digitising the kirana stores to accept digital payments and distributing mutual funds through Jio Money (payment app) as business opportunities.

Stating that media offers unique opportunities and synergies with telco, the analyst said Reliance has the dominant OTT platforms in India with content partnerships with Disney and Viacom. "With activities spanning oil and gas, telecoms, retail media and fintech, Reliance is one of the most diversified conglomerates in India if not the world.