Airtel to roll out VoWiFi this month

NEW DELHI: Bharti Airtel is preparing to commercially roll out voice over WiFi (VoWiFi) services this month, in a bid to improve indoor voice calling experience, having tested it with employees and select customers across circles, people familiar with the matter said.

Reliance Jio Infocomm has also been testing Vo-WiFi services in circles like Madhya Pradesh, Andhra Pradesh, Telangana and Kerala, the people said. The telco hasn’t decided upon a launch timeline. Jio didn’t respond until press time Monday to an email seeking comment.

The VoWiFi technology allows users to connect to a public WiFi hotspot or any standard private home WiFi network and make outgoing calls to any mobile phone number and landline, across operators, using handsets which support the technology.It is designed to plug indoor network gaps as operators continue to find it challenging to get site approvals and right of way in residential areas. VoWiFi will allow telcos to take on over-the-top players like WhatsApp and keep them from eating into their revenue, even as voice calling rates rise, say analysts.