Project Jupiter – that was the internal name of Reliance Industries’ project to push Jio Platforms Ltd towards its initial public offering – which is all set to be the biggest that the Indian stock market has seen.At Reliance Industries Ltd.’s annual general meeting last August, Mukesh Ambani informed shareholders that Jio Platforms Ltd. was targeting a stock market debut in the first half of 2026. Behind the scenes, however, the company was simultaneously working on three critical fronts. Nine months later, when Mukesh Ambani addressed shareholders once again at Reliance’s annual meeting, he announced that Jio was prepared for its public listing. Shortly afterwards, the company submitted its draft prospectus, with the investment bankers—who had spent weeks preparing in advance—ready to file the required documents immediately.
Project Jupiter
According to a Bloomberg report, Reliance engaged with regulators to secure greater flexibility in IPO rules, encouraging key investors to divest their holdings, and designing the country’s largest public offering while keeping its structure under wraps. The highly confidential initiative was internally code-named Project Jupiter, reflecting both its scale and strategic importance.Knowledge of the exercise was restricted for several months to a small group comprising senior Reliance executives and top investment bankers, the people said.Also Read | RIL AGM: From Jio Platforms IPO & satellite broadband focus to big AI & renewable energy plans – top takeawaysKey documents, including draft prospectuses, investor presentations and internal memoranda, were circulated mainly in printed form rather than electronically. Email communication was deliberately kept to a minimum to avoid creating digital records, while discussions were limited to a select group of senior officials.Reliance formally set Project Jupiter in motion by October. The confidential initiative was overseen by senior executives, including Chief Financial Officer V. Srikanth, KR Raja and Jio executive Anshuman Thakur, according to the people. Kotak Mahindra Capital Co. and Morgan Stanley were the first investment banks brought on board before the group of advisers was expanded in December.Although the banks had already begun working on the transaction, they were not officially appointed until at least December. People familiar with the process said this uncommon arrangement enabled the advisers to assist with the deal while its structure was still being finalised.One of Reliance’s key tasks was obtaining the consent of its existing investors. According to people familiar with the matter, KKR & Co., Meta Platforms Inc., Alphabet Inc. and other shareholders eventually agreed to dilute around 8% of their stakes on a proportionate basis.This enabled Jio to satisfy the minimum public shareholding requirement without altering the investors’ relative ownership in the company.At the same time, the regulatory environment was becoming more favourable. In September, India’s market regulator relaxed the minimum public shareholding norms for companies valued above Rs 5 trillion (about $53 billion), lowering the required dilution from 5% to 2.5%.The revised rules were officially notified by the government in March, removing a major regulatory obstacle for the proposed listing.The IPO structure also underwent a significant change. Reliance had initially planned to launch the offering through an offer-for-sale (OFS), under which existing shareholders would collectively offload around 2.8% of Jio, while the company itself would not issue any fresh shares.However, according to the people, several investors were uncomfortable with the proposed valuation amid a subdued equity market and the impact of the weakening rupee on their dollar-denominated returns.Around the same period, the government was also introducing measures aimed at encouraging foreign capital to remain invested in the country.Reliance subsequently restructured the offering into a completely fresh issue of shares, ensuring that the nearly $4 billion expected to be raised would be retained by the company and remain within India.The draft prospectus was filed on June 19, 2026 with 19 advisers. People associated with the transaction also noted an interesting coincidence—the filing date matched the birth date of Mukesh Ambani, who was born on April 19.
Jio IPO
The listing of Jio Platforms will be Reliance Group’s first initial public offering since Reliance Petroleum went public in 2006 before being merged back into Reliance Industries Ltd. (RIL).As part of the IPO, Jio will issue 27 crore equity shares with a face value of Rs 10 each, resulting in a 2.9% dilution of equity. This is broadly in line with Sebi’s revised listing framework, under which companies with a post-listing market capitalisation of more than Rs 5 lakh crore (around $60 billion) are required to dilute only 2.5% at the time of listing, while meeting the mandatory 25% public shareholding norm over the following 10 years.“This is a deeply emotional moment for me, the entire Reliance family, and millions of its shareholders,” Mukesh Ambani said while addressing shareholders at RIL’s annual general meeting.Describing the public issue as “the most important value-creation milestone this year,” Ambani said the listing process is being spearheaded by his children.Reliance Industries holds a 66% stake in Jio, which transformed India’s telecom industry after its 2016 launch by offering free voice services and deeply discounted data plans. Since then, the company has grown into the country’s largest wireless telecom operator.Jio Platforms, backed by investors including Google, Meta and the Abu Dhabi Investment Authority, is expected to be valued at more than $100 billion. Such a valuation would place it among India’s most valuable listed companies as well as one of the world’s largest telecom firms by market capitalisation.
