China-based device maker Xiaomi was urged to invest in Indian operator Reliance Jio after announcing plans to pump $1 billion into the country over the next five years.

Global Xiaomi representative Donovan Sung posted a tweet calling for people to contact the device maker with ideas for start-ups it could back as part of the investment plan, which will focus on companies developing technologies “related to the acceleration of mobile internet”.

Indian Twitter users swiftly responded by calling for Xiaomi to use its funding to back Reliance Jio, noting while the operator is not technically a start-up (it launched in September 2016), it is doing much to bring mobile internet access to users in the market.

The operator sparked a price war in India with aggressive pricing on mobile data. By Q3 2017 more than 80 per cent of data was consumed by its users, who are burning through an average of 9.62GB per month, the operator announced.

Xiaomi was also urged to deploy its Mi TV product (pictured, right) in India.

Accelerating growth
While an investment in Reliance Jio would meet Xiaomi’s stated aim in terms of mobile internet, the company’s co-founder and CEO Lei Jun said the real goal of the investment plan was to encourage the creation of local mobile apps for its smartphones, Financial Times reported.

Xiaomi appears to be turning its attention to content after securing a leading position in Indian smartphone sales. Figures released by IDC last week show the China-based vendor tied with Samsung at the top of the charts during Q3 with a 23.5 per cent market share. The research company noted Xiaomi almost tripled its shipments year-on-year to 4 million units, fuelled by demand for the RedMi Note 4 and an aggressive pricing strategy.

However, Upasana Joshi, senior analyst at IDC India, noted Samsung and Xiaomi must “further strengthen their channel play” as part of broader efforts to maintain their position at the top of the table in what is now a “hyper competitive smartphone market”.

Rival research company Canalys previously announced India surpassed the US as the world’s second-largest smartphone market after China during the third quarter.

Xiaomi is also in the midst of global expansion after securing a $1 billion loan in July. In early November it embarked on a launch into Western Europe as part of the broader strategy.

The vendor aims to dominate global sales charts by shipping 10 million units a month in the final months of 2017; a feat it remained on track to achieve at end-October.