Airtel Freedom Plan is poor copy of TATA DoCoMo. What do you think?
- Category: Editorial
- Saturday, 31 October 2009 21:41
- by Puneet Jain
Airtel has recently launched Pay Per Second call rates. The reason being - All the major Telecom Operators like BSNL, Aircel, Vodafone etc have started offering their consumers Pay Per Second Call rates.Telecom Industry in India was very competitive from last few years, it still is. But after the entrance of the new operator TATA DOCOMO, a kind a stir is created in Industry. TATA DOCOMO, the GSM brand of TATA Teleservices Ltd has revolutionized the Indian Telecom Industry by offering call rates as low as 1paise/second.
As I mentioned earlier that most of the major operators (Reliance is exception in this case - It launched Simply Reliance Plan) are now offering Pay Per Second Plans but most of the operators require their customers to make yearly or monthly recharges to enjoy the benefits of Per Second Pulse. However, TATA DOCOMO subscribers do not require any such yearly or monthly recharges to enjoy Per Second Pulse rates.
Comparison Between TATA DOCOMO's Pay Per Second Plan and Airtel's Freedom Plan :
TATA DOCOMO is offering Per Second Pulse as default tariff with lifetime validity to its subscribers. All local calls can be made with TATA DOOCMO at 1paisa/second. TATA DOCOMO is also offering STD calls at 1 paisa/second, however 2 paise/second will be charged after first 27,000 seconds of STD calls, in some circles 2 paisa/second is charged after first 15 minutes of STD calls.
Airtel is offering Per Second Pulse with the recharge of Rs. 64 - 94 (varies from circle to circle) with 1 year validty to existing customers, and new customers can avail Airtel Freedom plan at a cost of Rs. 66 - 99 (varies from circle to circle) for 1 year.
What made TATA DOCOMO Pay Per Second Plan better than Airtel?
- TATA DOCOMO Pay Per Second Plans are available for both Prepaid and Postpaid subscribers. However, Airtel’s Pay Per Second Plan is only available for its Prepaid users. Thus a major drawback is the absence of per second billing for Airtel postpaid customers
- TATA DOCOMO customers can enjoy Pay Per Second Tariff for life without any additional charge. Airtel Pay Per Second Plan comes with 1 year validity, so after one year a Airtel customer will have to pay some charges (right now its between 64 - 94) to continue with his Pay Per Second Plan.
- Airtel has decided to charge different rates for different networks. 1paisa/second is only for Airtel to Airtel calls. The rate for non Airtel calls is 1.2p/sec. Mathematically that makes it 20% more expensive than Tata Docomo which offers 1p/sec for all.
TATA DOCOMO has revolutionized the already fairly Dynamic India Telecom Industry. TATA DOCOMO must be feeling proud of itself. After all, Airtel tried to Imitate them and as they say, Imitation is the best form of Flattery.
Now I want you to share your views about TATA DOCOMO.
If you are a TATA DOCOMO subscribers do share your views about TATA DOCOMO with us.
If you are not TATA DOCOMO subscribers then do tell us how eager are you to get the new TATA DOCOMO connection?
Real Face Of The Price War In Maharashtra
- Category: Editorial
- Friday, 23 October 2009 13:59
- by Mihir Patil
Telecom price war in India has reached its peak because of the affordable schemes being launched everyday by almost every provider.Some schemes are really meant to create a strong impression on the subscribers whereas others are just a reaction to the main scheme.Today we are exposing all the schemes launched by various providers to gain attention and to increase the subscriber base.Some are cost friendly while others are having hidden charges meant to fool the customers.
We at MOBIGYAAN are keen to provide you the inner news. We have covered the latest offerings by the providers who have joined the priced war in recent period.Some providers are yet to roar and we expect that the price war will get even more fierce with the launch of two new companies namely ETISALAT DB and Virgin GSM by the year end.
AIRTEL:-Airtel's 62 Rs recharge is offering all local calls at 40 paise/min after the first minute of the day @ 1Re/min with a validity of 365 days. In other words Airtel is taking a daily rental of 60 paise/day for all local calls. STD is priced @ 50 paise after the first minute of the day @ 1.5 rs/min so the subscriber is indirectly charged 1 rs/day rental.
In short a subscriber has to recharge with 62 rs and again pay approx 48 rs/month(1.60 rs daily) to avail this facility. Any reason for people going in for this offer?? A user who doesn't want to change his/her number will definitely go for this offer but this doesn't mean the scheme is attractive.
Virgin Mobile-Virgin Mobile was the first to start the STD revolution before a year in India by offering STD calls as low as 50 paise/min with a capping of 30 minutes/day.However they have changed their marketing strategy from time to time without altering their scheme that much.
Presently Virgin is offering:
Local calls @ 50 paise/min after 3 minutes of the day priced @ 1 Re.
STD calls with a limit of 60 minutes/day priced @ 50 paise/min after the initial 3 minutes of the day priced @ 1/5 rs/min.
Subscriber has to pay extra 50 paise for 3 minutes everyday for local calls and same is the case with STD where the difference is as high as 1 rs for 3 minutes.
Indirectly a user has to pay 4.5 rs hidden daily rental everyday.
Monthly total is as high as 135 rs.
Definitely not a great scheme at this stage.
Tata Docomo-Tata Docomo started the price war by offering LOCAL & STD at just 1 paise/second.This scheme is very user friendly as user has to pay for only what they use without any daily rental or monthly recharge.
The benefit starts right from the first second so user gets the maximum out of this scheme without burning the pocket.
Docomo is also offering 100 local sms free/day after the first three priced @ 60 paise so a daily commitment of 1.80 Rs gives 100 local sms which is very cheap.
The only concern about Tata Docomo in Maharashtra and Goa circle is the newly laid network which will take some time to penetrate in every corner of the circle.
However Docomo is going strong with their per second policy as cards are being sold in black for as high as 300-400 Rs.
Reliance GSM-
Reliance has proved to be the best provider in this scenario with tariff as low as 50 paise for both local and STD without any daily rental or hidden charges.Local and National SMS are also charged @ 50 paise without any hidden charges.Reliance is also offering hassle free roaming tariff of 50 paise for both incoming and outgoing which is the lowest of its kind in prepaid Indian telecom sector.
This plan is named as "Simple Reliance" plan and is giving huge number of customers to ADAG(Anil Dhirubhai Ambani Group).
Reliance has proved to be the best provider in this scenario with tariff as low as 50 paise for both local and STD without any daily rental or hidden charges.Local and National SMS are also charged @ 50 paise without any hidden charges.Reliance is also offering hassle free roaming tariff of 50 paise for both incoming and outgoing which is the lowest of its kind in prepaid Indian telecom sector.
This plan is named as "Simple Reliance" plan and is giving huge number of customers to ADAG(Anil Dhirubhai Ambani Group).
Aircel-Aircel has re-launched its RC21 which used to offer all local calls @ 75 paise,50 paise & 25 paise for first,second and third minute respectively and all STD calls @ 75 paise/min with a validity of 3 months.Now RC21 offers all local and STD calls @ 50 paise/min after the first minute priced @ 1 rs and 1.50 rs/min respectively per day for both local and STD.
Local and national SMS are priced @ 50 paise/160 characters after spending 1 rs and 1.5 rs/day for local and national respectively.
This voucher has a validity of 3 months but the validity is of 5 months for subscribers taking new connection.
There is nothing extraordinary in this scheme.Infact the previous RC21 was better as at-least the local call rates were as low as 25 paise from the 3rd minute of the call.
Tata Indicom-Presently Tata Indicom has nothing to offer for STD calls.The New Let's Rock Scheme of Tata offers local calls for as low as 25 paise/min to any network from 9 pm to 9 am and it also gives unlimited free Local and National sms during 9 pm to 9 am without any pack.
However STD calls are priced @ 1 rs in this scheme and this scheme has a daily rental of 1 rs.
Tata Indicom has also launched per second billing scheme priced @ 61 rs with a validity of 60 days which offers all local calls @ 1 paise/sec and STD @ 2 paise/sec so the effective costing is 60 paise/min for local and 1.20 rs/min for national which is way high than what the other providers are offering presently.
From the above research it is clear that Reliance GSM and Tata Docomo are currently steering the Indian Telecom industry and giving sleepless night to the established players like Airtel,Vodafone and !dea.
Is JaJah's tweet2call service a killer to Telecos? Looks like yes!
- Category: Editorial
- Thursday, 17 September 2009 09:30
- by Manoj Kandasamy
When all the telcos are witnessing a great drop in voice calls and the focus turns towards VAS to boost the ARPU, here is the blowing news for them. JAJAH. What does Jajah do? Simply put, it helps you call any of your friends with the help of Twitter!When a Jajah member tweets “@call @twittername.” The tweet will cause both phones to ring, and the Twitterers will be connected without the service sharing either telephone number.
JAJAH@Call also works independent of the platform you use, so whether you use the web, a destkop client, or a mobile application when tweeting, the tweet-to-call service should work without hiccup.
Watch the demo video in the Jajah Blog. It’s quite interesting! http://www.jajah.com/products/twitter/
We’ve covered how Google Voice will make the life of Telecos more difficult in coming days. What jajah conceived is none other than the Nightmare for Telcos and Dream for the customers!
Do you think Jajah is a threat to telecos? Do post your comments and share with us what you think about this.
Indian mobile content market to hit $2.3bn by 2013. Are the carriers ready?
- Category: Editorial
- Thursday, 10 September 2009 15:11
- by Manoj Kandasamy
The latest study from “mobileSQUARED” predicts that the Indian mobile content which stands at $835.78 million in 2009, but will virtually triple by 2013! The predictions are based on the obvious growth on the Indian telecom industry which consists of more than 400 million mobile subscribers, which is also growing at 15 million new connections per month and will hit 700 million subscriptions by the end of 2010.In India, where ARPUs for carriers are declining, VAS has to be the next big focus. The Indian VAS market unlike the western and other Asian counterparts doesn’t have a great boost from mobile internet (though the numbers are growing). The primary sources of revenue from Indian market are from ringback tones, ringtones, graphics, wallpapers and mobile games. The RBT market constituting the largest single area of content.
We need to consider the fact that despite the delays in 3G roll out, the predictions are huge based only on the ever increasing mobile users. Even if 15% of Indian mobile users subscribe for 3G, the number will be huge where it could even surpass the total mobile users in many smaller countries!
The carriers on the other side are well prepared for the challenge too. The advertising route taken by almost all carriers in the last 6 months talks mainly about the VAS offered and how the life will be better with mobile internet! Carriers need to realize that Indian mobile user is a fast learner and early adopter of the trends. Users see what’s happening with iPhone/Androids in theUS and expects the Indian version of the content and not just the RBTs, wallpapers etc.
If acquiring the customers in this decade was a challenging one for carriers, the next challenge for them is to provide better content. The technology brings all the carriers on to the same line. No one is far superior. What matters the most is the CONTENT.
But personally, without opening up their doors for the mobile marketing, the carriers cant fullfil the need for providing different mobile experience for Indian subscribers.
Is this an indication to bring universal mobile chargers sooner than expected?
- Category: Editorial
- Tuesday, 21 July 2009 00:00
- by Manoj Kandasamy
I’ve come across custom made chargers similar to the picture in most of my friend’s place where around 3 or 4 guys stay in an apartment. What’s interesting is that even if they buy a new phone, they are not using the original charger since its easy to use this custom made multiple charger! They feel its painful to search for multiple chargers when they are in hurry! They want to find a charger where they just need to plug it and charge not to search for their charger! It just cost Rs. 75! ($1.5)Even though global mobile sales dropped by 9.4 percent for Q1, still 269 million units have been sold globally.It’s a HUGE number. Most of the time, users will upgrade their mobile with the same brand (Nokia to nokia) they might not need an additional charger.
When universal charger becomes mandatory, its easy for both consumers and manufactures. For consumers it’s a convenient way to be connected without worrying on the battery back up and for manufacturers it’s a cost saving exercise and reduction in carbon emissions. The GSMA calculates a reduction in greenhouse gases from manufacturing and transporting replacement chargers of 13.6 to 21.8 million tons a year. Cast-off chargers currently generate more than 51,000 tons of waste a year!
So far, 17 companies have agreed to the pact including 3 Group, AT&T, KTF, LG, mobilkom austria, Motorola, Nokia, Orange, Qualcomm, Samsung, Sony Ericsson, Telecom Italia, Telefonica, Telenor, Telstra, T-Mobile and Vodafone.
Will the new Google voice idea going to change the face of telecom operators?
- Category: Editorial
- Saturday, 18 July 2009 00:00
- by Manoj Kandasamy
Just few mins back, I’ve seen the demo video of Google voice service (Search for Google Voice in Youtube).To summarize the concept of Google v oice “They will have the face of the telephony” just like they did to Internet!When you register with Google voice, you will get your unique “Google Voice number”. You can connect all your phone connections (Office/home/mobile) to this Google number. You can divert the callers to the phone based on your convenience. For instance, if you are at a party you can divert them to your mobile, or when you are in office, you can divert the callers to your office number.
Now, callers don’t know where you are. But they will call your Google Voice number. Based on your settings, the call will be diverted to you! If you don’t want to wish to talk to some one, you can divert them to Google voice mail, and even you can receive the voicemail message in text format delivered to your mobile!
The best part is even when you change your mobile number; you just need to assign your new number to the Google Voice number which will be unchanged (like your gmail id).
It will help consumers for sure. But, for the mobile operators?
Mobile numbers are being the face of telecom companies. Imagine when more people go with Google number it will affect the brand equity of the carrier! Imagine if Google comes up with a mobile search (Already launched in Hyderabad, India) and it diverts users to their voice search engine! Revenue lost to carriers.
What’s amazing in Google’ strategy is that when they have Interface to the callers they can get enormous database of customers mobile nunber! They can even use the numbers to send text alerts by tracking them through GPS and enable a location based advertising using Google maps, Google latitude etc!
Google might change the face of telecom carriers beginning today.
It’s too scary to imagine one company to be the face of Both Internet and telecom!
Is Tata DoCoMo another kid in the race?
- Category: Editorial
- Wednesday, 15 July 2009 00:00
- by Manoj Kandasamy
This is first guest post by Manoj Kandasamy. If you would also like to write for us then contact us
Is Tata DoCoMo another kid in the race?
I think NO!
NTT DoCoMo is one of the advanced carrier in the world.
They come from japan where
-96% are on 3G and 35% are on 3.5G
-85% of subscribers use online services
-Users can buy garmets worn by the models via mobile phone
-Almost every one using some form of m-Commerce and mobile payments
Is Tata DoCoMo another kid in the race?
I think NO!
NTT DoCoMo is one of the advanced carrier in the world.
They come from japan where
-96% are on 3G and 35% are on 3.5G
-85% of subscribers use online services
-Users can buy garmets worn by the models via mobile phone
-Almost every one using some form of m-Commerce and mobile payments
When its comes to technology, no one can beat DoCoMo. They have come here to India a hot market with tremendous opportunity in telecom at the right time . What DoCoMo brought from japan are great learnings in implementing advanced technology,consumer insight insight towards connected lifestyle and they have a strong back-end support to implement many firsts in telecom space in India!
Almost all carriers have shifted their focus towards VAS due to the decline in ARPU. Youngsters going to define the market especially in telecom. When they need to be attracted they have to be feed with stuff they never experienced. DoCoMo is capable of doing that.
What more can one ask when they have a partner in TATA? When number portability gets introduced, then it will separate men from boys!
DoCoMo is here to rule. Not just stay. And to re-write the strategies of competitors.
Almost all carriers have shifted their focus towards VAS due to the decline in ARPU. Youngsters going to define the market especially in telecom. When they need to be attracted they have to be feed with stuff they never experienced. DoCoMo is capable of doing that.
What more can one ask when they have a partner in TATA? When number portability gets introduced, then it will separate men from boys!
DoCoMo is here to rule. Not just stay. And to re-write the strategies of competitors.