One billion mobile users in India by 2015

India could have more than one billion mobile phone users by 2015, with the bulk of that growth in rural areas, one of the country's top telecom executives said on Wednesday.

Manoj Kohli, chief executive of India's biggest mobile phone group Bharti Airtel, told an industry conference in Hong Kong that his firm is aiming to almost double its customer base to 200 million people in the next few years.

"Achieving a billion plus (Indian mobile users) by 2015 is possible," he told the Mobile Asia Congress, the region's largest telecom industry gathering.

"The largest growth will happen in the rural market," he said, adding that pricing wars between providers were knocking down rates in the Indian market and making phones affordable to more people.

Competition in India has become even more aggressive as new players unleash deeper price cuts with innovative per-second billing plans that have pushed call costs down to less than a cent a minute.

"There is hyper-competition like no other place in the world," he said.

India is the world's second-biggest cellular market with more than 400 million users, lagging behind only China, which has over 600 million users.

Rural customers are also seen as key to growth in China, said Chang Xiaobing, chairman of China Unicom, one of the nation's three major telecoms operators.

The company aims to tap "vast rural areas" for growth as demand for basic mobile voice services slows in saturated urban markets, he said, with customers now looking for multi-function devices that can send emails or play movies.

"Voice is a mature market in some areas, but we still see some growth potential," Chang told the conference. "Voice will be in continuous demand (in China)."

But Chinese operators must boost their data business to offset falling prices on voice calls, he said.

Chang has said he expects Apple's iconic iPhone, which Unicom distributes, will be China's highest-selling smartphone despite disappointing results after its official launch this month.

Mobile connections in Asia Pacific are expected to cross the two billion mark this year, more than triple the level in 2003, according to statistics released by conference organiser GSMA, a mobile industry trade group.

Agencies

Can messaging technology attracts rural mobile users?

India has emerged as the most favorable market for telecom players with the rate of mobile users growing at over 10 million per month. By end of 2008, there were 340 million active mobile users in the country. After focusing the needs of the enterprises, urban users and the youth, the spotlight is now on the rural users with most players looking at avenues to expand in the rural markets. Even though mobile phones have reached the rural areas, simple applications such as messaging is still a foreign mode of communication; the most common reason being unfamiliarity to English.

Realizing the needs of rural people, Noida based Luna Ergonomics, a texting technology company has come up with a software, which will help people send text messages in 11 major Indian languages by using only 'ek angootha' (one thumb). One just needs to upload the company's Panini software in his/her mobile phone and start using the texting facilities. But this technology can only be used only in mobiles that have java applications pre-installed.

The company has made available four versions of the software - Panini Basic, Panini Clever, Panini Premium, and Panini Touch. Specifications have been done according to the usage of every version. Panini Premium would offer a superior version of CleverTexting and different modes of Ergonomic typing on the phone than Panini Basic and Panini Clever. Major Abhijeet Bhattacharjee, Founder, Luna Ergonomics says, "Panini software also offers SMS compression, first of its kind in the world, increasing the payload of an SMS in an Indian language by over 300 percent. Once a message is compressed, it is sent in encrypted form."

"Other than mobile phones, this software can also be used in other devices like remote and set-top-box," he explains.

"To make this facility available to large number of people, we are in talks with phone handset companies to pre-embed the application on the phone. We are also trying to negotiate with well known retails," says, Bhattacharjee. This technology could be very useful for mobile marketing services, he adds. In the beta version of the launch, the company has witnessed over 50,000 downloads from all across India and world.

With an aim of providing better technology to connect all through regional languages in the country, Bhattacharjee, a retired army officer founded Luna Ergonomics in 2008. Prior to founding the company, he had worked in organization like Gurus Media, Monster.com in different posts. Under the umbrella of Luna Ergonomics, five employees currently work on the development of this technology.

The company plans to unveil its latest product in the siliconindia Start-up City event to be held on June 06 in Bangalore.

SiliconIndia

What can you do with 3G services In India?

With 3G, the next-gen mobile service launched in Delhi, your handset becomes an all-purpose device. Here’s what all you can do and what it offers.

* Browse Internet and send, receive large emails including graphics. 3G also enables faster movie downloads.

* Make video calls and videoconference (possible on 3G to 3G calls).

* Get streaming TV on phone screen with pause, record features. MTNL’s IPTV network currently offers 4 channels, will expand to 10 channels in 10 days and 40 in 2-3 weeks.

* Remote access footage from CCTV (could also help police and in traffic management).

* Play interactive games on Net sites, access bank accounts and shop online.

* Get high-speed Web navigation, maps.

* 3G services give mobile users high-quality voice transmission and access to high-end data applications on their mobile phones.

2G vs 3G
3G represents the next step in the evolution of mobile telephony, offering markedly greater capacity and efficiency than the current 2G systems.

While 2G is focused on voice, 3G supports high-speed data of at least 144 kbps enabling broadband Internet access on the mobile, and "triple play" features like mobile TV and converged communication services.

Similarly, 3G will allow operators to enhance their capacities for voice traffic as well. Currently, key operators are facing severe 2G spectrum crunch in top 20-30 cities which is hampering their future growth. As the government has indicated that it has limited spectrum left for 2G services.

Also, while 3G is good for data services, it is also three times more efficient than current technologies in packing in subscribers.

Top speed
* 2G -- 10kb/sec

* 3G -- 2mb/sec

Time taken to download a 3-min MP3 song
* 2G -- 31 to 40 minutes

* 3G -- 11 secs to 1.5 min

How much will it cost?
MTNL will release tariff plan after a month. It’s only servicing corporate clients at the moment and will rely on their feedback before commercial launch.

Source: Times of India