World Phone Launches Cable Broadband Services In Delhi, NCR @ Rs 95 Per Month

Internet service provider, World Phone Internet Services Pvt. Ltd has announced that it has rolled out cable broadband internet services in the region of Delhi and the National Capital Region (NCR) at a low monthly tariff of Rs 95.

Moreover, the company also said that it has signed up an agreement with the majority of cable service providers across Delhi and NCR for offering this service

Mr. Aditya Ahluwalia, chairman, World Phone Internet Services Pvt. Ltd, said, “We hope that with this price tag and the quality of service we will be able to garner at least 5,000 subscriber in the first three months.”

“Lower monthly commitment would be a strong and bold step by World Phone for enhancing broadband penetration in masses,'' Mr. Ahluwalia added.

Mr. Ahluwalia said that clients subscribing to World Phone’s new monthly internet service tariff of Rs 95 will be offered a speed of up to 256kbps with a 200MB data download limit.

As of now the services will be introduced in selected regions only. After Delhi, World Phone plans to extend its reach to Mumbai, Jaipur, Ahmedabad, Hyderabad and Kolkata in coming months.
He also said that World Phone had added plans including unlimited plan, hourly plan and data limit based plan to match various needs of internet users.

World Phone will also initiate the idea of providing pre-paid service, using recharge vouchers from the cable operator.

This price band at its lowest rates is not the first time, which the company has broken trends of high charges.

In 2007, World Phone turned the first Indian internet service provider to declare the lowest possible tariff for its global call rates to USA, UK, Australia and Canada.

“World Phone Internet services private Limited has ushered a new era in communications for India. We offer a simple and dependable technology that will never let our subscriber down.

Backed by constant innovations and a 24x7 customer support, a World Phone connection will ensure the user is connected to the world at all times,” added Mr. Ahluwalia.

Motorola MOTOZINE ZN5 Phone Unveiled in India

Motorola today announced the Indian launch of MOTOZINE ZN5.

This phone was developed in association with Kodak. The ZN5 is the first phone to combine Motorola’s “ModeShift Technology” and KODAK “Imaging Technology”.

In addition, the new mobile phone is preloaded with Kodak EasyShare software. Moreover, the camera includes an ultra-fast 5 megapixel camera with auto-focus and a Xenon flash.

The stylish phone also features multiple capture modes like multi-shot and panorama, which automatically aligns, captures and stitches together continuous shots taken on the horizon line into a single, extended image.

Users can further upload their photos on various social networking sites through ShoZu via Wi-Fi. User can also transfer images on the computer by Bluetooth or USB.

Besides, consumers also have the flexibility of sharing pictures on their television set with a TV-out cable.

Talking about the newly introduced handset Ian Chapman-Banks, corporate vice president and general manager, Asia, Mobile Devices, Motorola, “Today’s creative consumers not only want to be the photographer, but also the retoucher, the exhibitor and the critic.

With the MOTOZINE ZN5 we allow people to unleash their power of curiosity, creativity, impulse and play, whenever the mood strikes. So go and click, capture and share all you want.”

Other features of the MOTOZINE ZN5 phone include CrystalTalk technology for flawless conversation even in noisy environments and dual compatibility for GSM and Wireless Local Area Network.

The first phone in ZINE series, ZN5 will be available in the India from mid-September 2008.

The phone will be bundled with a 2GB memory card and a TV-out cable for easily viewing pictures on a television set.

World Phone launches cable broadband services in Delhi, NCR

Internet service provider, World Phone said that it has launched able broadband internet service sin the region of Delhi and NCR at an monthly rental of Rs99.

World Phone claims that it has entered in to an agreement with most of the cable service providers in the region.

The company further plans to extend its reach to Mumbai, Jaipur, Ahmedabad, Hyderabad and Kolkata in the next few months.

Condom ringtone launched in India

NEW DELHI — A cellphone ringtone that chants "condom, condom!" has been launched in India to promote safe sex and tackle the growing HIV/AIDS epidemic.The "condom a cappella" has been designed to break down Indians' reluctance to discuss condom use and to make wearing a condom more acceptable.

Organisers of the campaign, funded by the foundation set up by Microsoft mogul Bill Gates and his wife Melinda, hope the ringtone will become a craze among young Indians.About 2.5 million people live with HIV in India, said the BBC World Service Trust, the charity behind the ringtone, which was released this month. It can be downloaded at

condomcondom.org.

"Ringtones have become such personal statements that a specially created condom ringtone seemed just the right way of combining a practical message with a fun approach," said Radharani Mitra, creative director of the BBC World Service Trust.

"The idea is to tackle the inhibitions and taboos that can be associated with condoms."India is the world's fastest-growing mobile telephone market with 270 million users according to the latest official figures, up 57 percent in just one year.

Nokia launches N96 in India

This has definitely been the most awaited phone in India as far as Nokia are concerned. Lets just put aside the Apple iPhone 3G for the moment and concentrate on the new offering from Nokia.

The Nokia N96 comes with a 2.8 inch TFT screen which as a resolution of 240 x 320 pixels. This means a neat 16 million colors display for your multimedia dreams. The phone runs on a Dual ARM 9 processor clocking 264 Mhz CPU speed.

The phone has 16GB of internal memory which definitely is enough to compete with the Apple iPhone. The N96 comes with 128 MB RAM for faster program applications.

If this 16GB of memory is not enough for you, there is a microSD card slot into which you can slot in your 8GB card and enjoy 24GB of movies and music.Other features are top of the line data connectivity options like EDGE, HSDPA, GPRS and bluetooth A2DP.

The phone adds on a 5megapixel camera to overtake itself in features against the iPhone. Video calling is possible with the VGA camera in front of the phone. The phone has a 3.5mm headphone socket which acts as a TV out. FM Radio with a GPS chip built in the phone, 3D stereo speakers and a lot of bundled data comes with the phone.

TRAI allows Internet Telephony

New Delhi, Aug 18: In a decision, which could have a far reaching consequence in future, the Telecom Regulatory Authority of India (TRAI) on Monday allowed Intenet Telephony in India.

In view of TRAI’s decision, the fall in long distance telecom tariffs has now become inevitable.

The TRAI ruling permits one to make calls from personal computers to fixed line and mobile phones."It is envisaged that customers will ultimately benefit from cost effective and innovative internet telephony service. These recommendations will put Indian telecom sector in tune with global trends.

The grey market tendencies shall be curtailed," TRAI said in a statement. As per the TRAI recommendations, the STD service providers would be connected to ISPs through public internet for the purpose and the two service providers would have mutual agreement for the same. Earlier, voice call made from one computer could travel to another computer but not from a mobile or a fixed line phone.

This has opened huge channels of revenues for the Internet Service Providers (ISPs), who wouldn’t need to acquire a Unified Access Service Licence (UASL) for operating these services. The Telecom Engineering Centre (TEC), a technical arm of Department of Telecom, will work out the number plan for the ISPs to enable them to offer telephone services.

"Telephone numbers from identified blocks shall be allocated to ISPs, Unified Access Service Providers, Basic Service Providers and Cellular Mobile Service Providers for internet telephony," TRAI said.

With a view to make internet telephony secure, TRAI said, all ISPs interested to provide unrestricted internet telephony would install "Lawful Interception" equipments.Presently, ISPs are not permitted to provide unrestricted Internet Telephony though they have IP-based infrastructure. The decision is also likely to benefit telecom service providers like Vodafone and Idea, who don’t have national long distance licence/network and use other operators’ networks to carry long distance calls.

These operators can carry their NLD calls using their IP network.While access service providers are permitted to provide various services and applications to their subscribers under Universal Access Service License (UASL), the role of other licensees like NLD and ILD is limited to provide long distance services and ISPs are permitted for internet access.

"Such regulatory restrictions discourage technological advancements and result in grey market activities to provide these services to common masses," the statement added.TRAI said due importance have been given for level playing to various service providers, interconnection mechanism, inter connect usage charges, numbering, lawful interception, emergency number dialling, interoperability, quality of service and others.

"Overall licensing framework has been protected while permitting unrestricted internet telephony to ISPs" TRAI said. The new TRAI ruling is also likely to boost competition between established UASL holders such as Bharti Airtel, Reliance Communication, Vodafone and BSNL.

The ISP’s and the telecom operators have been at loggerheads with each other on this issue, with the operators asking for a level playing field. BSNL had pointed it out to the regulator that allowing ISPs will further erode the revenues earned by national long-distance licence holders, while Bharti and RCom had pointed out that in case connectivity between PCs to fixed and mobile phones is allowed, ISPs should be asked to migrate to UASL.

Telecom players have to shell out Rs 1,650 crore for a pan-India UASL, while ISPs pay token Re 1 as the licence fee and the ISPs providing PC to PC telephony have to pay 6% of their adjusted gross revenue. The ISP’s however, say that the Rs 1,650 crore fee includes the start-up spectrum cost as well, which will not be used by the ISPs while providing the connectivity between PCs and fixed and the mobile lines. They have also suggested a formula in case they are allowed terminating the ILD calls.

Bharti Airtel crosses 75 mn subscriber base

NEW DELHI: India's largest private telecom company Bharti Airtel on Sunday said it has crossed the 75 million customer mark to become the fourth largest in-country mobile operator in the world.

Bharti Airtel is now behind China Mobile, China Unicom and American AT&T in terms of subscriber base, a company statement said. The subscriber figure includes customers from all business units of the company, mobile services, telemedia services and enterprises services, the statement said.

The mobile services devision has a customer base of 72.07 million as of July, 2008, it added.The mobile business provides mobile and fixed wireless services using GSM technology across 23 telecom circles. Commenting on the landmark Bharti Airtel CEO and Joint Managing Director Manoj Kohli said, "We are happy to have achieved this milestone of being the largest integrated telco in the country, in customer terms.

For us, the benchmark of real leadership is customer delight and would like to thank all our customers for placing their faith in us." The company had crossed the 60 million customer mark in February 2008 and the 50 million mark in October 2007, thereby becoming one of the fastest growing telecom companies in the world, the statement added.

China Mobile with 414.5 million customers as on June 2008 is at the No 1 position followed by China Unicom with 170.7 million subscriber base. AT&T is marginally ahead of Bharti with a subscriber base of 72.9 million in June this year