Jio BlackRock Asset Management Pvt. Ltd, which had initially planned to sell mutual funds directly to consumers, has now begun reaching out to distributors, three people familiar with the matter said.
The Jio BlackRock AMC has reached out to select distributors to understand how the distribution model could work, one of the people said.
“They are considering distribution to increase inflows and also get better collections during new fund offers (NFOs) in the future,” said the second person.
When it started, the AMC announced plans to focus entirely on a direct-only model and bypass the traditional distributor-led model. It planned to monetize its own app and fintechs to market its mutual fund products.
The company's move comes after a muted debut of its first equity scheme, the Jio BlackRock Flexicap Fund.
Launched in October 2025, the Jio BlackRock Flexicap Fund's assets under management (AUM) stood at ₹2,613 crore at the end of January, compared with ₹2,808 crore of the Abakkus Flexicap Fund, launched in December 2025.
"For a name like Jio BlackRock, it should have seen a higher uptick in its flexicap fund. Trying to go purely direct in India, especially for a new AMC, might be difficult," said Srikanth Meenakshi, co-founder of mutual fund research platform Primeinevstor.
In a 6 September interview with Mint, its chief executive, Sid Swaminathan, said people were becoming increasingly comfortable managing their finances digitally on their phones, and its partnership with Jio, which has access to that ecosystem, gave it a clear understanding that this is the direction it wants to pursue. “We aim to see how direct digital approaches work," Swaminathan had said.
However, it did not rule out taking the distributor route at some point in the future. “We do not rule out physical distribution at some point down the line", he said in a 30 October Mint interview, but the focus at the moment is to fully harness the “power of the phone".
In a direct model, the investor does not pay a commission to the mutual fund distributor for advising them. In a distributor model, the investor pays the distributor for giving advice, which is cut from the investor’s expense ratio.
In a statement on 24 February, a spokesperson for Jio Blackrock AMC said the asset manager received more than 1.1 million investors in the seven months since its launch in June 2025, "with over 40% investors coming in [from] B30 and 18% new to mutual funds investors, which is above the industry average and speaks to the success of our digital first strategy". The term B30 refers to locations beyond the top 30 places from where mutual funds get their assets.
An indispensable channel
Since Jio BlackRock announced it would offer low-expense ratios for its funds, it is also looking at distributors willing to accept lower commission payouts, the third person added.
“Even with distributors, expense ratios can stay low—it depends on commissions, but models already exist where the regular-direct gap is very low,” said Meenakshi of Primeinvestor.
“Our focus has always been on democratizing investing by expanding market participation. As we scale, we will continue to evaluate opportunities that align with our product value proposition, with the overarching objective of making our offering simple and accessible to more investors in India,” Jio Blackrock AMC said in an emailed response.
Distribution remains one of the key drivers of mutual fund asset growth. In the overall mutual fund AUM, distributors still account for 55.2% as of December 2025, according to the Association of Mutual Funds of India (Amfi). Within equity schemes, this number is even higher. Distributors bought 72.4% of investments in equity-oriented schemes in December 2025.
In 2005, Fidelity Investments entered India, tying up with only a handful of distributors while promising to eventually go directly to customers. “Fidelity ran full-page newspaper ads saying, ‘We are Fidelity’, and wanted investors to come directly. They empanelled only 50-100 distributors across India, apart from top banks,” said a distributor. However, later, Fidelity empanelled a lot of distributors, even beyond the top 30 cities.
“Younger investors prefer tech-led platforms, while wealthier investors need advice. While small amounts can be invested directly, larger sums typically require guidance,” said Manish Kothari, co-founder at Sebi-registered mutual fund distributor ZFunds.
He added that Jio may have attracted many do-it-yourself (DIY) investors through its tech-led approach, but bigger, advice-seeking investors who typically come via distributors may have skipped Jio.
Santosh Joseph, founder at Sebi-registered mutual fund distributor Germinate Investor Service, explained that whenever a mutual fund says it will go direct-only, it’s usually based on two assumptions. “First, they believe their product is unique, and there will be a pull factor from investors. Second, the performance is so strong that investors will search for them and invest directly.”
However, neither of these assumptions is permanent, he said. “If the product is unique, it will not stay unique for long. Eventually, the market catches up. And if performance is strong, someone else may outpace its performance,” Joseph added.