How Ambani is teaming up with Zuckerberg

Mukesh Ambani's $25bn pledge to launch 5G services, is aimed to further edge out competition not just in telecoms but also retail.

The second part of that plan will see two giants joining forces - Mr Ambani's Reliance and US technology giant Meta - formerly known as Facebook, reports BBC.

In a country of 1.4 billion people, there are nearly 500 million users of Meta's WhatsApp platform - a user base Mr Ambani is hoping to entice with his online retail offering.

India is also WhatsApp's largest market and Meta boss Mark Zuckerberg, has been looking to push its WhatsApp business platform - which allows commerce on the messaging platform - for over a year now.

With this collaboration, Reliance will be able to extend its reach in the online retail sector. And for Meta, partnering with a leading player like Reliance and making its services available to all users on WhatsApp, gives it a stronger hold in India.

India is home to a nearly $700bn retail market and we have seen big businesses jostling to dominate that space.

Reliance Retail operates India's fastest growing and most profitable retail business, with over 12,000 stores across the country.

And with their combined might they hope to take on and beat online retail giants like Amazon and Walmart-owned Flipkart.

Writer: Arunoday Mukharji is an Indian Correspondent of BBC