Most leading handset makers like Nokia have joined the fray. They all see huge business opportunity in this lucrative space. For example, BlackBerry’s app store, just a few months old, boasts of well over 4,000 apps; same is the case with Google’s Android. It has already touched the 20,000 apps mark.

Interestingly, the top mobile operators, nearly two dozen of them, are collaborating on the apps space. The members of this powerful alliance comprise SingTel, AT&T, China Mobile, NTT DoCoMo, Deutsche Telekom, Telefónica, Telenor Group, Orange, Verizon Wireless, Vodafone and Sprint. The logic behind the move is that mobile service providers have lost substantial revenues to handset makers because of independent developers being allowed to access their platforms.

According to research firm Gartner that tracks global IT & telecom industry trends, app stores amassed more than $4.2 billion in revenues globally last year. It suggests that the revenue would increase multifold by 2013, touching nearly $30 billion mark. App stores have clearly emerged as a lucrative revenue stream for developers and handset makers.

No surprise, top mobile firms like Vodafone Group and Bharti Airtel have joined in to leverage this space. The latter announced that its app store had gone live with over 1,200 applications. In fact, Bharti Airtel is the first telecom company from Indian to try replicate Apple’s hugely successful business model. Its CEO Sanjay Kapoor mentioned in an interview to The Economic Times that the Wholesale Applications Community looks to bring together a fragmented marketplace.

The aim is to create an open industry platform to benefit applications developers, network operators and of course, mobile phone users.

A spate of sponsorship and advertising opportunities unveiled by the IPL management include television media (Colors and Sony Max), as well as Internet (YouTube), ground sponsorships, team sponsorships and theatre rights.

According to sources with media buying firms, the third season of IPL has opened up exciting avenues for smaller advertisers as well, so the clutter will only increase. To overcome the clutter factor, advertisers are taking innovative steps such as ground activations, co-branded fan clubs and catchy advertising on YouTube. The brand rush to ride the IPL popularity wave indicates that sport marketing is now getting its due attention in India.

As already reported, Google claims a huge success in its web-casting of the IPL on YouTube. There is immense amount of euphoria over the experiment. The Internet giant has reportedly set a rather modest target of about 10 million unique viewers and 40 million cumulative hits for the 60-match long IPL league, but the targets could well be surpassed going by the trend.

Meanwhile, Airtel, among the country’s leading three Broadband players, has come up with an offer for IPL fans. They can avail of a full 1Mbps upgrade over its existing 1Mbps bandwidth to view the live telecast on YouTube sans any buffering issues. Airtel is one of the official sponsors of the IPL. Its speed bump offer will continue till April 25. There are no extra charges, though you’ll need to pay for data transfer.

Tata Docomo is a service which is debuting on the GSM circuit and claims to bill you per seconds! Such an alliance symbolizes both companies’ dedication and their commitment to the development of India’s ever growing mobile phone market. During the starting stage their plan is to capture the market in Southern India and then head nationwide.

The GSM market is filled to the brim with well established telecom giants which command a good amount of market share (  Bharti (35.4) BSNL (25.4) Hutch-Essar (25.3) Idea (13.6) ), its very clear that they are heading into a David and Goliath kind of altercation. It definitely seems like a tough task ahead, but knowing Tata as a reliable company they just might be able to penetrate the market and leave its mark.

Referring to the CDMA technology, Tata was a late entrant in this section as well with their brand Tata Indicom. It has made its mark in the CDMA market and is also one of the fastest-growing pan-India operators. Tata Teleservices have managed to acquire a pan-India license to operate GSM telecom services, under the brand TATA DOCOMO and they have been allotted spectrum in 18 telecom Circles. Will this venture stand the tides of the telecom giants? Well only time can tell.

The Industry average revenue per user for Public sector companies reflects that the companies have attracted price-sensitive, low-minutes usage for its subscribers and hence, the subscriber base would find no use for 3G services as 3G pros being services which include wide-area wireless voice telephone, video calls, and wireless data, all in a mobile environment. 3G networks enable network operators to offer users a better service while achieving greater network capacity through improved spectral efficiency. And like the popular saying goes, good is always followed by bad which forces us to stumble across the pros as well as the cons.

And the Cons include-

•    Differences in licensing terms between states
•    Lack of state support for financially troubled operators
•    Cost of 3G phones
•    Lack of coverage in some areas
•    High prices for 3G in some countries
•    Battery life of 3G phones

Almost forgetting to mention the fact that there was a bidding involved for technology, when all the cash flows away in buying the technology, we wonder where would the public sector companies gather financial support from. In the six months of its 3G launch, BSNL has roped in just 10,733 subscribers and the figure for MTNL stands at a dismal 902, an average of just 150 per month across Mumbai and Delhi, considered the two most lucrative circles for 3G in India.

However both the public sector companies deny the fact that buying the technology has created any sort of financial issue for both, infact they are in a position to venture newer applications. Having private sector giants gauging on the limelight, will public sector companies be able to leave a mark? Well let’s leave them with some serious thinking.

The Tigo network has two million subscribers being Sri Lanka’s third largest network and is part of Millicom International. The network has operations in Laos and Cambodia other than Sri Lanka where it has a business worth $150-200 million.

Airtel ‘s Sri Lankan arm, which launched mobile services last year, has already invested $125 million in Sri Lanka against a commitment of $250 million. Bharti entered the Sri Lankan market early this year and have a million subscribers within six months. Other competitors for the network include Russia’s Vimpelcom, Malaysia’s Axiata Group and UAE’s Etisalat.

This move comes as a surprise as Airtel has been in talks with MTN for one of the world’s biggest telecom mergers.

Bharati has yet to make a firm bid which should be done in a few weeks.

TTML has 2.5 million users in the 20.4 million strong Mumbai subscriber base.  The second-biggest telecom circle in India has 10 brands vying for subscribers where Vodafone Essar is the leader with 4.6 million users. TTML will be employing existing CDMA infrastructure for its GSM services rolled out in Mumbai and rest of Maharashtra. The Tata’s GSM services are functional in Karnataka, Tamil Nadu, Chennai and Andhra Pradesh.

TTML has a capital expenditure of Rs 1,000-crore and plans on offering services at one-paise-per-second. The price point should stiffen the competition leading to probable price-cuts by competitors. The GSM rollout adds up to the GSM clutter and the only beneficiary would be the end-users. In the GSM war subscribers would have many options to choose from.

Till the news surfaced Bharati Airtel was banking on its cash reserves and short-term investments of Rs 6,300 crore towards the merger. The delay of the third generation (3G) spectrum auctions till next year enables Airtel to use reserves for the MTN deal. Though the talks were scheduled to end on July 31 it looks there is going to be an extension to the same due to the new hurdle.

On the other hand Vodafone India reported revenues of Rs 6,000 crore. In the three-year period the largest phone company roped in 7.7 million subscribers.

The company earned Rs 5,011 crore from voice services and Rs 175 crore from messaging services. While data services had 30% higher revenue of Rs 350 crore other services added the Rs 560 crore to the kitty. The latter figure includes revenues from Indus Towers (a JV with Bharati Airtel and Idea Cellular).

But the Idea steals the spotlight this quarter. The fifth largest telecom entity in India surprised industry experts with a 13% growth in consolidated net profit at Rs 297 crore. The merger with Spice and rapid rollout in new circles has boosted the business. Plus it added a staggering 4.1 million users.

The reduction in termination call charges from 30 paise to 20 paise has effected the revenues of all Indian telecos. So the final standings are …

If everything go as planned citizens would soon be able to register feedback, suggestions or grievances against the police through text messages (SMSes). This would eliminate visits to the police station or phone calls. A simple SMS should work the wonder.

According to the Minister of State the system would bring transparency in the department. But ironically there are dedicated helplines that serve the same purpose. In fact an addition of a new system for the SMS service is not necessary. It simply leads to confusion. This is not the first time an SMS service leaning on public interest has been introduced.

DigiMouth had reported about the success of the Central Railways SMS campaign which was introduced a few months ago. Even Western Railway had introduced the same in a bid to improve their services through customer feedback. Both the campaigns have received a splendid response since their initiation. We hope the planned SMS service for the city police really changes the state of affairs.

Currently the system is awaiting approval from senior police officials.

With presence in 30 foreign countries Matrix offers cost-effective post-paid cards to Indian travellers. An Indian traveling to the US shells out Rs 75 / minute for an incoming call and Rs 175 / minute for outgoing. But Matrix offers Rs 30 for outgoing and Rs 15 for incoming calls. The company does not own infrastructure or spectrum; in fact it buys purchases bulk airtime through agreements with operators in varied countries. In the ned they sell the same airtime (minutes of traffic) to customers. With revenues of Rs 150 crore in FY09 the company is aiming a 35-40% increase.

It is a win-win situation for TTSL, simply because:
- Matrix products would perfectly fit TTSL’s CDMA subscriber base
- It would help TSSL offer lower call rates to subscribers going abroad
- It can offer matchless global roaming which is currently a deterrent under its CDMA platform

This move comes in after talks between Matrix and Essar Group’s retail arm The Mobile Store (TMS) have stalled. TMS proposed a merger with Matrix in a share swap deal.

Well Airtel seems to have taken a clue form biggies Apple, Nokia and RIM who have been using independent developers to create their mobile technologies. In fact the barrage of apps for the iPhone is the best example.

AODC offers tools to write apps, a software development kit and training to build applications for the PC, TV and mobile. The best part is that developers get to create technologies for Airtel’s 110 million + subscribers base; they would be creating apps for the mobile, Intenet, DTH, IPTV and of course landline users. Apparently over 1000 developers have signed up for the Community.

Other than the iPhone Google’s mobile operating system Android is an open source platform. Not to forget Microsoft’s Windows Marketplace designed for independent software developers. Even Vodafone has it won developing platform buffed Betavine.

This is great news for application developers as AODC would act as a revenue model. Plus they get to hone and showcase their skills.