3030 makes its presence felt

To give you an example of how 3030 is showing up, I shall talk about a typical day, a weekend.

Just imagine being stuck in traffic behind a slow moving auto rickshaw. It is but natural that you would notice what’s written behind it. I saw an advertisement for a website called propertysensex.com printed behind the auto. It said that one could SMS Sensex to 3030. I jumped!

Earlier in the morning, the last page of the newspaper had given me another glimpse of our very own 3030 beneath a full-page ad for UNITECH group’s new construction. Moving over to the supplement, I found 30308888 peeping from an Indiatimes promo. More surprise was in store as I flipped through the pages of India Today, and found another full page ad with 3030 in the contact information for a new car from the GM Motors stable.

Later in the day I stopped at a Barista outlet, and as I waited for my coffee, I flipped through their newsletter and found 3030 smiling at me from every single page of the tabloid sized newsletter.

Marathi TV watchers of India are seeing 3030 every single day on Mi Marathi, as they are asked to participate in a contest where they have to spot an umbrella and SMS the name of the serial to 3030.

The best part of my day was when I ended up at Elevate, the disco to unwind in the evening. I spotted a whole wall filled with 3030, as I stood in the queue for my turn to come! Must have been some 100-200 pamphlets with 3030 prominently displayed on them covering the wall.

This is another plus of our enterprise business; visibility to our short code. I am sure by the time it becomes 53030, I would have many more stories to tell!

Smita Rajan

Eyes Wide Open

Walking into one97 rather apprehensive – my first day in a new office and a new industry , I had heard about it, spoken about it yet was still contemplating what VAS was all about … Value added services was great but what more? …..hardly knowing that I used the applications daily and honestly can’t live without it . 

 I started my graph of learning at what was one 97 who they are and what they are , and to my surprise I had landed into a company that spoke , ate and slept technology ( imagine me who hardly knew , a soft copy from a hard one ) Terms like OBD , CRBT , RBT flew over my head as Vijay spoke , assured that I would learn I sat in the conference room quietly amongst a team of product guys talking about WAP , VOICE . USSD and SMS , finally the last term I was well acquainted with (……. breathing a sigh of relief I wasn’t lost ) after all it did constituted to 91% of the mobile bill I receive every month .

 Its been 28days and so far as I can say I’m amazed at the way VAS is growing and so is this company , the secret an amazing team of people who together are a force to reckon with, who are passionate, gung-ho and extremely dedicated ( I know I may be the corp. comm. Manager and image building is one of my K.R.A’s but truly an amazing lot )I am yet to see a person who doesn’t walk-in with a smile on his face or isn’t happy to be here .

I guess I’m learning about this industry and like a child in toy store I’m playing with a new toy everyday and of course realizing that I have been a boon to this industry in spending large sum’s of money on picking an appropriate CRBT ( ya I know the term ) , spending a better part of an hour on it and not releasing it costing me a bomb ….. Well lesson well learnt, I’m keeping my ears and my eyes wide open, let‘s see what more I can learn .

- to be continued some time

Exciting times ahead

Indian Telecom space is heating up and how! Gartner’s research predict wireless services to hit $25.61 billion by year 2011. Year 2006 figures touched $2.95 billion making the growth per annum to be 18.4% per annum in the period 2007 – 2011. As expected, growth in data revenue will outpace voice revenue with a contribution of 22% in total wireless revenue in year 2011 as opposed to 9.6% in 2006.

 

Despite rapid expansion of wireless services in India, only about 2% of rural areas are covered while the total coverage area is 12.7%. Gartner predicts that of the expected 38.6% total coverage, 58% will be rural based connection and 95% will be urban connection.  

 

Drivers which we feel will fuel this growth are:

#   Lower entry level tariff

#   Under $25 handsets with current emphasis on research to provide entry level handsets

#   Attractive pricing of bundled up services with handset

#   Increased focus on rural marketing of cellular services

#   Greater efficiency in deployment of services

#   Integration of market players

#   Concentration of telecom operators to provide core service and marketing of these services

#   Further drop in call rates to match the landline rates

#   Expansion of businesses in semi-urban and rural areas

#   Availability of wider array, localized and user specific mobile Value Added Services

 

With the subscriber base expected to be 462 million by 2011, user friendly simple-to-use applications that can tap into the needs or aspirations of users will see fast adoption. Each region has its own need, but certain common denominators exist. Entertainment will always remain the primary desire of a subscriber (besides connectivity, of course).  Whether we take up from current scenario of TV and movie based entertainment or create new genres, Value Added Services developers and provides are never going to be short of space to expand.

 

And then there are services that fulfill needs of the users. Rural areas, which lack means of dissemination of information, will adopt such services if they are available at affordable prices. One of the most exciting applications will be the related to medical facilities. These facilities are relatively inaccessible to rural population. Their availability by means of video conferencing or even as a voice service is a space waiting to be tapped. Urban population, which is used to greater array of services, will demand their availability on mobiles.

 

Data revenue at rate of 22% of the predicted $25.61 billion works out to be $5.63 billion – enough to keep the existing players excited and attract new talent into this space.

VAS INDIA 2007

This year  VAS INDIA had a substantial turn out, all to discuss the VAS  business opportunities growing at almost 40% per annum (some even claiming 50%). The market today is said to be over Rs 4,500-crore. This is in spite of a major spectrum hurdle.  One wonders if government had kept its 3G promises what would have happened to our economy. Our  guess is a parallel VAS economy supplying content to the world like no other VAS economy in the world.

Vijay  Shekhar sharma was one of the key speakers at the conference and spoke about VAS in the Indian Telecom Industry and the new avenues to explore within an already growing industry .

For those  who missed out here’s vijay presentation …..