Both Facebook and Google have invested in the same behemoth entity - Reliance Jio. Half of this Google digitization fund goes into investment in Jio. Facebook and Google have both invested near identical $5 billion sums into Jio, which gives them under 10% each. Both made investments after Mukesh Ambani (net worth approx $75 billion) who owns the Jio platform, put a 20% stake on the block in spring 2020.
It doesn't get them much by way of control, but they're simply responding to the reality that Jio is THE big dog of Indian mobile data, and if they have no stake in it, they lose. With <10% stakes each, they just ensure they each have a stake in a mobile market with 1.1 billion subscribers, but neither are strong enough to demand anything from Ambani.
Biting the hand that feeds IT
