Contents - Connect-World

Contents 

4 & 5 - Connections 51 - Last Words 52 - Reply Card 

6 

10 

Social Development 

Socio-economic growth of India in 

a networked world 

by Mukesh Ambani, Chairman and Managing Director, Reliance 

Infocomm Limited 

Information and communications technology will be 

central to the networked society. It will not be only a 

question of hardware. Ubiquitous communications 

and social networking software will facilitate the 

organisation of social interactions and forge new communities. 

Networks will reform the structure of societies 

and redefine the business landscape. Technology 

can propel India to leadership in a networked world. 

National Development 

Vision and opportunities in the 

Indian telecom sector 

by Prithipal Singh, Convenor, National Advisory Council, 

India-Tech Foundation’s TELECOMM India 2004 

Telecommunications in India began in 1853. Only in 

the last decade, though, did market-based reforms 

begin to make telecommunications service possible 

for most of the population. Since then, tele-density 

has increased five-fold and service tariffs have gone 

down substantially. Nevertheless, although urban 

tele-density is close to the global average, rural teledensity 

is considerably lower and sharp regional variations 

exist. 

21 

23 

28 

Networking India’s interior 

by Venkat Kedlaya, Managing Director, Convergent 

Communications, India 

The interior of India is far behind the countrys urban 

areas in the use of ICTs. Many programmes are working 

to bridge this gap. Information kiosks that let rural 

populations access the Internet for a series of services 

have been successful, but providing connectivity, 

developing local language content and applications 

and making it affordable have been a challenge. 

Industrial Development 

Managed telecommunication services 

and a vibrant economy 

by Thomas White, Senior Vice-President & General 

Manager, Communications Solutions Group, Agilent 

Technologies 

Indias growth as a global economic power depends 

upon its telecommunication infrastructure and high 

quality services. Telecom operators need effective network 

and service management for their highly profitable 

corporate accounts. To deliver world-class services, 

operational support systems that collect, consolidate 

and prioritise information, to present an aggregated, 

real-time view of service quality for targeted 

customer accounts is essential. 

ICT and new India 

by Sudhir Rao, Managing Director, Bartronics India 

Limited 

13 

17 

India’s intellectual capital – its 

neural network 

by Dr Jon Earith, Chief Technology Officer, MBT 

India is transforming itself through the exploitation of 

its intellectual capital, building upon education to 

drive the country from service provider to innovator 

and technological leader. Indian companies have 

long offered IT services internationally, providing 

coders for western software. Today, companies in 

search of overall value look to Indian offshore partnerships 

for the distinctive skills and high performance 

they offer. 

From tortoise to hare: the transformation 

of Indian telecom 

by Dr Arun Mehta, Chief Technical Officer, Net Radiophony 

India 

DOT was Indias primary supplier of phone services and 

its telecom regulator. When India opened its market, 

private companies and new entrants, unlike DOT, paid 

high licence fees and suffered technology restrictions. 

To level the field a regulatory agencyTRAIwas 

established, but DOTs resistance defeated it. A special 

court now handles telecom disputes and the sector is 

growing. 

31 

Today, every Indian can talk to anyone throughout 

the world. With mobile telephony, India is now part 

of the always connected world. Indian software 

engineers are now working in large corporations 

around the globe. Every new technology is available 

in India within days, and newer, better, more productive 

business processes are used in every sphere of 

business. 

India, ICT and the service sector 

by Deepak Jain, General Manager IT Solutions, Telecom 

Industry, Wipro Infotech 

India is a world leader in IT & BPO services. The government 

issued licences allowing a number of new 

competitors to offer telecom services. The improvement 

in Indias telecommunications has helped many 

industries, including important international consumer 

goods companies that have shifted their data centres 

to India to telcos offering data centres and reliable 

global connectivity. 

1

34 

36 

Business Development 

Value-added services in Indian markets 

by Sanjiv Mital, CEO of Bharti Telesoft Intl. Pvt. Ltd 

Wireless telephony has overtaken fixed telephony in India. 

Indias market potential is enormous, but market fragmentation 

is a challenge. The success of vernacular FM broadcasting 

shows the potential of local language service offerings to 

boost mass acceptance. Vernacular voice services can bring 

large numbers of Indias text averse and text illiterate subscribers 

to an operators fold. 

Communications and commerce in 

digital India 

by Ramesh Krishnan, Director of Operations, VeriSign 

Communications Services, India 

The urban Indian is a mobile carrying, e-mail savvy, consumer 

who is reaping the benefits of a global digital revolution. 

Indias middle-class has huge buying power. This is the result 

of Indias emergence as the worlds back-office and software 

development super-power. Indias people, enterprises and 

government, can transform the worlds largest democracy into 

the worlds largest digital economy. 

Connectivity 

45 

47 

Enable seamless services with 

softswitching 

by Venkat Eswara, Senior Marketing Manager of Systems 

Marketing and Portfolio Management, Global Telecom Solutions 

Sector, Motorola, India 

Operators expect converged core networks to reduce investment 

needed to deliver a competitive range of services. 

Indias unified licensing plan, which lets operators select access 

alternatives for each servicefundamentally changes the 

market. Softswitch / IP-based, architecture provides low cost 

service, covers wide areas and facilitates seamless connections 

between a wide variety of wired and wireless networks. 

Education 

Training and future of India 

by Dr Ashok K. Chauhan President, Amity Institute of Telecom Technology 

and Management (AITTM) & Founder President, Ritnand Balved Education 

Foundation (RBEF), Chairman AKC Group of Companies 

Today, ICT (Information and Communication Technology) 

drives economies throughout the world. ICTs, though, both 

create and destroy work opportunities, as labour intensive 

jobs are replaced by machines. This poses a challenge for 

higher education. India has some 200 million adult illiterates, 

but projects such as the Computer Based Functional Literacy 

(CBFL), that teach adults to read 400450 words in their own 

language through a multimedia puppet show progamme, 

provide a modern solution to a traditional problem. 

40 

Digital India – the underwater connection 

by Peter Ford, CEO, Global Marine Systems Limited 

Billing and Mediation 

42 

Indias success providing outsourced services has shown its ability 

to conquer international markets. International connectivity 

is crucial to continue Indias international success. Satellites and 

submarine cables, historically, were too expensive and satellites 

do not have the capacity. Technology, though, has reduced the 

cost of submarine systems and developing countries can now 

afford regional systems to compete in global markets. 

VoIP – opening the way for India 

by Amit Chawla, Executive Vice-President, Global Marketing, 

Veraz Networks 

49 

Preparing for mobile growth 

by Tero Laaksonen, President and CEO, Comptel, and Marianne 

Tikkanen, Market Analyst, Comptel 

Indias three-digit mobile growth rate is a happy problem, 

but extraordinary growth requires the expansion of everything. 

Flexibility to grow is a prime reason for using mediation 

and service provisioning systems. These act as flexible 

rubber bands between the network and back office systems. 

During a system changeover, mediation is indispensable as it 

provides uninterrupted billing. 

India has one of the worlds top ten telephone networks. Still, 

penetration is low and demand for basic telephony, long distance, 

cellular and other services is high. Indias growth as a 

provider of outsource services depends upon its communications. 

The government is working to liberalise and deregulate 

Indias telecommunications sector to facilitate competition 

and the entry of new service providers. 

Push to Talk 

IT Solutions 

Advertorial Features 

9 

15 

All articles are available online at: www.connect-world.com 

2

- photo : ginko 

www.ipmgroup.com

CONNECTIONS, CONEXES, CONEXINES, CONNEXIONS 

Fredric J Morris 

Editor-In-Chief 

India is vast in every sense of the worda vast landmass, vast population, vast markets, 

vast talent, vast potential and vast problems. India's economy is growing and the country 

is well on its way to becoming a high-tech powerhouse. Its software sector is respected 

throughout the world and its hardware sector shows signs of growing strongly in the 

coming years. Investment in the information and communication technology sectors 

should exceed US$100 billion over the next few years. India, by these standards is truly 

a success storyor will be if it can bring the results of this stunning progress to the vast, 

even in this, percentage of the population that lives on the edge of the market economy. 

Connect-World's new Indian edition will explore how, in the opinion of top-level leaders 

and decision makers, the technology sector's success can be harnessed to move India forward, 

improve the lot of the bulk of its population and propel India to its destined place 

on the world stage. The theme of this issue of Connect-World India is Digital India – A 

Giant on the March. 

Social Development As Mukesh Ambani of Reliance Infocomm Limited sees it, ubiquitous 

communications and social networking software will facilitate the organisation of 

social interactions and forge new communities. Networks will reform the structure of societies 

and redefine the business landscape. 

National Development Prithipal Singh, the Convenor of India-Tech Foundations 

Telecomm India 2004, traces how telecommunications in India began to grow in the last 

decade and how market-based reforms in the 1990s finally made telecommunications 

services available to the bulk of the population. 

According to Dr Jon Earith of MBT, India is transforming itself by exploiting its intellectual 

capital. India has built upon education to drive the country from service provider, to 

innovator, to technological leader. Now, companies throughout the world look to Indian 

offshore partnerships for the distinctive skills, high performance and overall value they 

offer. 

When India opened its market, explains Dr Arun Mehta, of Net Radiophony India, private 

companies, the new entrants, unlike the government incumbents, paid high licence fees 

and suffered technology restrictions. This hampered the growth of telecommunications 

until DOTs influence in the sector was curbed. 

The interior of India is far behind the countrys urban areas in the use of ICT. Many programmes 

are working to bridge this gap. Convergent Communications Venkat Kedlaya 

tells of the need for connectivity, and the challenge of developing local language content 

and applications, and making it affordable. 

Industrial Development Thomas White from Agilent Technologies outlines why Indias 

growth as a global economic power depends in large part upon its telecommunication 

infrastructure and high quality services. To deliver world-class services, operational support 

systems that collect, consolidate and prioritise information, to present an aggregated, 

real-time, view of service quality for targeted customer accounts is essential. 

Sudhir Rao at Bartronics looks at the reasons India, now part of the always connectedworld, 

has been able to put its software engineers to work in large corporations around 

the globe. This may be due in part to the availability, within days, of every new technol-

ogy and the fact that newer, better, more productive business processes are now in use in 

every sphere of Indian business. 

Wipro Infotechs Deepak Jain notes that India is a world leader in IT & BPO services. 

Indias improved telecommunications has helped many local industries grow and convinced 

important international consumer goods companies to shift their data centres to 

India to telcos with reliable global connectivity. 

Business development Sanjiv Mital of Bharti Telesoft believes that although Indias market 

potential is enormous, market fragmentation, especially linguistic, is a challenge. The 

success of vernacular FM broadcasting shows the potential of local language service offerings 

to boost mass acceptance. Vernacular voice services can be enormously helpful to 

Indias text averse and text illiterate subscribers. 

Ramesh Krishnan of VeriSign Communications Services focuses upon the urban Indian a 

mobile carrying, e-mail savvy consumer who is reaping the benefits of a global digital revolution. 

Indias middle-class is the result of the countrys emergence as the worlds backoffice 

and software development super-power. India, the worlds largest democracy, may 

soon become the worlds largest digital economy. 

Connectivity Peter Ford of Global Marine Systems finds that Indias success providing 

outsourced services has shown its ability to conquer international markets. International 

connectivity is crucial to continue Indias international success. Now that technology, has 

reduced the cost of submarine systems, developing countries can now afford regional systems 

to compete in global markets. 

Amit Chawla of Veraz Networks explains that India has one of the worlds top ten telephone 

networks, but penetration is low and demand for basic telephony, long distance, 

cellular and other services is high. Indias growth as a provider of outsource services 

depends upon its communications. 

Parmindra Kwatra and Venkat Eswara from Motorola observe that operators, today, expect 

converged core networks to reduce investment needed to deliver a competitive range of 

services. Softswitch / IP-based architecture provides a low cost, wide coverage option that 

provides seamless connections between wired and wireless networks. 

Education Dr Ashok K. Chauhan of the Amity Institute of Telecom Technology and 

Management stresses that although ICT is driving economies throughout the world, it is 

both creating and destroying work opportunities as machines replace low-skilled workers. 

This poses a challenge, but such projects as Computer Based Functional Literacy that 

teach adults to read 400 - 450 words in their own language, can provide a modern solution 

to a traditional problem. 

Billing and Mediation Tero Laaksonen and Marianne Tikkanen of Comptel argue that 

Indias three-digit mobile growth rate is a happy problem, but extraordinary growth 

requires the expansion of everything. Mediation and service provisioning systems act as 

flexible rubber bands between the network and back office systems, so are indispensable 

to provide uninterrupted billing when systems change or expand.


Socio-economic growth of India in a networked world 

by Mukesh Ambani, Chairman and Managing Director, Reliance Infocomm Limited 

Information and communications technology will be central to the networked society. It 

will not be only a question of hardware. Ubiquitous communications and social networking 

software will facilitate the organisation of social interactions and forge new 

communities. As wireless moves ahead, it will redefine how government interacts with 

citizens and transform the lives of people in remote areas. Networks will reform the 

structure of societies and redefine the business landscape. Technology can propel India 

to leadership in a networked world. 

Mukesh D. Ambani is the Chairman and Managing Director of Reliance Industries Limited, Indias largest 

business house and the first and only private sector company from India to feature in the 2004 Fortune 

Global 500 list of Worlds Largest Corporations, Mr Ambani is also the Chairman of Indian Petrochemicals 

Corporation Ltd. and a Director of Reliance Europe Ltd. Mr Ambani is currently involved in rolling out 

Reliance Infocomm Limited — one of the worlds largest and most complex information and communications 

technology initiatives. Mr Ambani is the Chairman of the Foundation for the International Federation of 

Red Cross and Red Crescent Societies, in Geneva. In India, Mukesh D. Ambani is Chairman of the Board of 

Governors of the Dhirubhai Ambani Institute of Information and Communication Technology, and the 

Chairman, Board of Trustees of The Indian Institute of Software Engineering. Mr Ambani is a member of 

the Prime Ministers Council on Trade and Industry, the Board of Governors of the National Council of 

Applied Economic Research; the Council of Scientific and Industrial Research (CSIR); and of the Advisory 

Council of the Indian Banks Association. Mr Ambani earned his Bachelor of Chemical Engineering degree 

from the University of Bombay and an MBA from Stanford University, USA. Mr Ambani is the recipient of 

a great many prestigious national and international awards and honours. 

The technological revolution currently 

sweeping the globe offers 

India an exciting opportunity to 

bring about a quantum leap in its 

developmental journey. It is now 

possible for India to join the ranks of 

great powers within the span of our 

generation. 

Technological breakthroughs now 

make it possible to banish poverty, 

illiteracy and malnutrition from the 

lives of all our people. Opportunities 

to make all this a reality are knocking 

at our doors because we are moving 

to a networked world. In such a 

world, there will be new forms and 

formats of living. This will impact 

not just on society, but also business 

and polity. Technology will pull 

down geographical and political barriers 

and close the gaps of time and 

space. 

Technology will be central to the networked 

society. Within technology, 

information technology and communications 

will be the key. This is simply 

because networked societies 

depend on the flow of information. 

Here again two technologies will play 

a key role — the Internet and wireless 

communication. 

The Internet will be more about connecting 

people to people than connecting 

people to portals and websites. 

It will take the form of a network 

of identities and relationships 

that transcend corporate or national 

affiliations. 

On one plane, the creation of new 

communities will come about by 

associations of shared interests and 

goals brought together in the virtual 

world. On another plane, new social 

networking software would be in 

vogue. 

Social networking software will mine 

web traffic and look for new relationships 

to acquire customers. They 

would also help analyse patterns of 

behaviour among existing communities 

to help improve the value of relationships 

through, for example, higher 

sales. Social networking software 

would also optimise the organisation 

of social interactions. This could 

take the form of shared purchases 

and unified articulation of issues. 

Globalisation will induce greater collaboration 

across borders. The pressure 

to increase efficiency and productivity 

will force companies to collaborate 

like never before. In manufacturing, 

different components of 

the production process will be located 

in different places of competitive 

advantage. Such forms of collaborative 

manufacturing would spread to 

every other sector. 

In research, an explosion of knowledge 

and greater specialisation will 

force science-based collaboration. In 

business, a move towards standard 

common business processes will 

improve efficiency and productivity. 

In new initiatives, increasing risks 

will entail strategic alliances for risk 

mitigation. 

New lifestyles will change social 

organisation. Family systems will 

face the challenge of accommodating 

diversity of aspirations. 

Migration of professionals within the 

country and across borders will create 

new nodes for social organisation 

in alien territories. Extended life 

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span, caused by modern medicine, 

will bring about a new social demography. 

Greater competition will alter the 

work-life balance. The world will 

shift to a brutal work culture punctuated 

by intensive competition, right 

sizing and increasingly demanding 

professional skill sets. The need to 

earn in the prime of a shorter working 

life will be immense. This will 

conflict with the need to lead a higher 

quality of living over a longer life 

span and will create enormous physical 

and mental pressures. Such 

pressures will pave the way for individuals 

to seek new sources of emotional 

bondage outside the family. 

The ubiquity of communications will 

forge new communities. The 

Internet and satellite television will 

vastly expand the global reach of 

communities bonded by common 

goals and interests. Lastly, the concept 

of a nation state will become 

obscure, caused by the strengthening 

of multilateral trading blocks, greater 

migration of professionals across 

borders and increasing acceptance of 

dual citizenship. 

Greater global scrutiny will question 

sovereignty, as a right to do whatever 

a government likes within its borders. 

New global information infrastructures 

will emerge in such areas 

as meteorology, energy, security, 

trade and industry. 

Wireless technologies will force their 

way into more and more sectors. 

Today, wireless is used mainly to 

move information. In the future, 

wireless will be used to promote collaboration 

over a wide range. E- 

learning among community groups 

in an income and location independent 

framework, will become increasingly 

important, and will let teachers 

and parents collaborate in monitoring 

the progress of students. 

Wireless will link doctors with 

patients in remote regions, and the 

remote monitoring of the elderly in 

homes, and critical care patients in 

hospitals, will reduce the burden 

upon both the family and public 

facilities. Wireless will deliver government 

services to people in remote 

areas. 

The remote, automatic monitoring of 

streets will foster better internal 

security and reduce crime. Wireless 

communications will link the transportation 

systems in the supply chain 

and bring reduced costs and more 

timely deliveries. Information - 

enabled farming and fishing communities, 

collaborative robotics in manufacturing, 

disaster response and 

warfare will all be facilitated by wireless. 

Virtual product design and testing, 

rapid prototyping for mass customisation 

or for specific user group 

needs, the transmission of field data 

to control systems and control 

rooms, remote maintenance of field 

equipment, collaborative tele-working 

in a location independent framework 

and promoting gaming within 

communities are all on the list of 

activities that wireless will enhance; 

the list is virtually endless. 

Greater connectivity among citizens, 

communities, and companies will be 

the sum and effect of all these developments. 

The drive to connect will 

grow by leaps and bounds. Networks 

reform the morphology of societies. 

It will go far beyond caste, community, 

race and religious connections. 

Networks will redefine the landscape 

of businesses. 

We believe in fostering the development 

of a networked world in India 

through its next-generation information 

and communications network 

spanning the length and breadth of 

India. This will be based both on 

Internet and on wireless technologies. 

ICT—Information and Communication 

Technology—has made a deep impact 

across the length and breadth of 

India. 

India boasts some of the worlds lowest 

entry costs and the worlds lowest 

usage charges for any telecommunications 

service; ICT is re-defining an 

entire industry. Wireless operators 

have acquired millions of new customers 

this last year. More importantly, 

a surge in data applications is 

being brought about. 

Data services are now generating 

countless millions of hits per day, 

even surpassing the data usage of 

many developed countries. All this 

demonstrates the readiness of the 

Indian people to use advanced technology, 

given the right impetus of 

costs, access, and services. 

Today, applications development 

laboratories are developing several 

networking applications on both 

wireline and wireless platforms. 

Electronic school applications, to 

bring parents and teachers together 

virtually through the Internet or 

using mobile technology, are one 

example. A social networking application 

to bring common user groups 

together on a wireless platform is 

another. 

Fleet management on a wireless platform 

for the transportation community 

is one more case in point. For 

the ICT sector, the mobile revolution 

is only a beginning. The next step, 

going beyond the mobile revolution, 

is to bring about a broadband revolution. 

A networked world is no longer a figment 

of imagination. It is steeped in 

reality. Concepts such as friendship 

flow charts and community cascades 

will be in vogue. As networks get bigger, 

their value to users will increase 

exponentially. 

Companies will derive value by 

devoting resources to hook into 

external networks, understand the 

broader changes among constituent 

communities, and respond appropriately. 

Citizens will derive value in being 

part of communities with shared 

interests and goals, gaining through 

new perspectives, unified articulation 

of issues, lower purchase costs, 

job referrals and so on. Countries 

will derive value by sharing information 

infrastructures and harmonising 

trading within trading blocks. A networked 

world will substantially 

improve the efficiency and output of 

productive enterprises and social 

entities. 

India has a unique opportunity to 

jump ahead in a networked world. 

Fortunately, India is not weighed 

down by a legacy of narrow band 

access systems. We have already created 

an ubiquitous, high capacity, 

low cost, information and communication 

infrastructure and there are 

plans to provide an overarching 

broadband access to every home and 

every office across India. This will 

enable a paradigm shift in communicating, 

teaching, learning, treating, 

governing, working and shopping. 

India has the opportunity to leapfrog 

decades of economic lag and social 

deprivation. A network revolution 

can copiously enhance productivity 

and open new avenues for social and 

economic growth. It is a vital force in 

shaping the future of Indian homes, 

offices, governance and public services. 

It can powerfully propel India 

to global leadership in todays world 

of information and knowledge. 

8

Advertorial - Push to Talk 

Push to Talk 

Push-to-Talk (PTT) has taken the US and European 

markets by storm. In the US, PTT is responsible for 

Nextel’s impressive 10 million subscribers and revenue 

that contribute some 4 per cent of all revenues 

in the US mobile market. In Europe, Orange 

is targeting one million users in their first year following 

an unexpected launch in the UK and France 

in the second quarter of 2004. PTT is seen as the 

next killer application that promises a new stream 

of revenue and profitability. 

Asia Pacific looks set to jump onto the bandwagon 

this year. Operators in the region are already conducting 

PTT trials, while vendors are thronging to 

introduce PTT solutions and rolling out PTT-enabled 

handsets in order to have a piece of this lucrative pie. 

How then, can operators in Asia fully exploit PTT 

technology to maximise consumer and business 

ARPU 

"LG Telecom and KTF are preparing to roll out 

nationwide push-to-talk (PTT) service as early as 

September. SK Telecom is expected to offer the service 

within this year." 30 June 2004, Telecom Asia 

"With initial service trials already complete, 

Guangdong Mobile says that it is now ready to test 

consumer reaction to push-to-talk ahead of a full 

service launch in the second half of the year." 2 June 

2004, Telecom Asia 

"Tata Teleservices has launched push-to-chat services 

based on Qualcomm's BREWChat, and according to 

Qualcomm is the first operator to launch the service." 

2 June 2004, Telecom Asia 

The biggest dilemmas the operators face include 

selecting the right PTT platform, time to launch, pricing 

and tariff plans, market positioning, handset 

availability, lack of standardisation and interoperability. 

These are all critical issues that have to be treaded 

on carefully; that operators must resolve, in order 

for PTT roll-out to be a success and a significant revenue 

booster. 

Push to Talk World Asia 2004 

12 - 13 October 2004 

Grand Copthorne Waterfront Hotel, Singapore 

www.terrapinn.com/2004/ptta_SG 

Key speakers and panelists include: 

Amit Bose, President, Tata Teleservices, India 

Alvin Seck , Head, Corporate and Channel Sales, 

Digital Network Access Communications, Singapore 

Charles Henshaw, Executive Director & CEO, China 

Resources Peoples Telephone Company, Hong Kong 

Lars Brenk, Chairman, Game Services Working 

Group, Open Mobile Alliance 

Chan Kin Hung, Senior Vice-President, Mobile, 

Starhub, Singapore 

Yatin Padwa, Senior Manager, Marketing, Bharti 

Cellular, India 

K. Pratthana, Service and Solution Development 

Manager, AIS Thailand 

Louise MacFarlane, Group Marketing Manager, 

Consumer Mobile, Optus, Australia 

Greg Young, Group Manager, Wireless Enterprise 

Products & Services, Telstra, Australia 

Sign up now! 

To register, call our Customer Service Manager at 

+65 6322 2701 or register online via 

http://www.terrapinn.com/2004/ptta_SG 

To assist operators in Asia in the vital decision-making 

process, Terrapinn is proud to present the first operator-focused 

Push-to-Talk conference in Asia. Push to 

Talk World Asia is a director-level business event for 

push-to-talk (PTT) and push-to-talk over cellular 

(PoC) services in Asia. The conference will bring 

together Asian leaders of telecommunications to discuss 

strategic business, marketing and technical 

issues involved in exploiting PTT to maximise telecom 

ARPU. 

9


Vision and opportunities in the Indian Telecom sector 

by Prithipal Singh, Convenor, National Advisory Council, India-Tech Foundation’s TELECOMM India 

2004 

Although telecommunications in India began in 1853, it was only in the last decade that 

market-based reforms of the telecom sector began to provide service for the vast majority 

of the countys people. Since then, tele-density has increased five-fold and service tariffs 

have gone down substantially. Nevertheless, although urban tele-density is close to the 

global average, rural tele-density is considerably lower, and sharp regional variations exist. 

Bringing universal access and universal services to India will require heavy funding and 

massive efforts. 

Mr Prithipal Singh is currently the Convenor of the National Advisory Council of India-Tech Foundations 

TELECOMM India 2004. Prithipal Singh previously served as the CMD of BSNL, India’s largest telecom company. 

Mr Singh was founder Director, Operations of BSNL Board. Before, Mr Prithipal worked as Chief 

General Manager, Rajasthan Telecom Circle, PGM, Chandigarh and in different posts in the Department of 

Telecommunications. Mr Singh is a graduate in Electrical Engineering from Punjab Engineering College. 

Introduction 

In a progressively converging Information, 

Communication and Entertainment 

environment, the imperative is to provide 

universal access. The Maitland 

Report of 1984 entitled "Missing 

Links" put forward the objective that 

by early part of the next century virtually 

the whole of mankind should be 

brought within easy reach of a telephone. 

One of the most quoted statistics 

from that report was that "Tokyo 

has more telephones than the whole of 

the African continent." 

The term Missing Link essentially 

refers to the lack of telecom infrastructure 

in developing countries. The 

report highlighted the growing 

inequalities in telecom resources 

between developed and developing 

countries. It observed that there is a 

direct correlation between the availability 

of, and access to telecom infrastructure 

and a countrys economic 

growth. Of course, according to some, 

it is economic growth that fosters telecom 

growth. Perhaps there are elements 

of truth in both the propositions; 

they interact with each other, 

leading to the growth of telecom and 

economy in a country. 

Indian scenario 

In India, the year 2003 was celebrated 

as the 150th year of Indian 

Telecommunication/Telegraphy. 

Telegraph services commenced in 

India with a link established in 1853, 

which is nine years after Samuel 

Morse invented the telegraph transmitter. 

Telephone came to India soon 

after Alexander Bell invented it in 

1876. However, at the time of independence, 

there were only 80,000 

telephone subscribers and that too, 

mostly government oriented. In fact, 

governmental monopoly pervaded the 

entire sector from manufacturing to 

providing services. 

The Mission for Better Communication, 

which ushered in the PCO (Public Call 

Office) revolution in the eighties, 

could be considered as a starting point 

for reforms in the telecom sector. This 

was followed by the National Telecom 

Policy of 1994 definition of Value 

Added Services; the opening up of 

Basic Services and the constitution of 

a statutory regulator. 

However, reforms progress was 

bogged down in litigation and difficulties 

faced by the operators in paying 

the licence fee determined through the 

bidding process. Consequently, the 

New Telecom Policy of 1999 and the 

migration of the existing operators to 

a revenue sharing licence fee regime 

significantly accelerated the growth of 

this sector. The hallmark of NTP 1999 

was market-based reform with unrestricted 

entry in all sectors except the 

cellular mobile services where availability 

of spectrum was a limiting factor. 

10


Since NTP 99, the growth of the telecom 

sector has been significant. Teledensity 

increased from 1.44 per cent to 

7 per cent, and rural tele-density 

increased from 0.4 per cent to 1.5 per 

cent. Cellular Mobile has grown from 

1.2 million to 40 million subscribers. 

Fixed lines have doubled to 45 million. 

Public Call Offices have tripled to 1.5 

million. Optical Fibre increased from 

64,000 to 450,000 route kilometres, 

and no place is 25 kilometres away 

from Optical Fibre access. 

Village Public Telephones are now 

found in 85 per cent of the 600,000 

villages. Tariffs have been reduced for 

all types of service. Cellular tariff has 

been reduced from Rs.16 per minute 

to about Rs.2 per minute. National 

Long Distance tariffs have been 

reduced by 62 per cent, International 

Long Distance by nearly 50 per cent, 

and Internet telephony will reduce 

them further still. 

A Universal Service Fund Administration 

has been set up to provide financial 

support for voice and data telecommunication 

access in non-viable areas. 

In spite of the significant growth in 

tele-density, there is still a divide 

between what may be called Bharat 

and India. While urban tele-density 

exceeds 15 per cent, rural penetration 

is only 1.5 per cent. 

In the Southern states, tele-density 

averages 7 per cent, but the East has 

barely 2.3 per cent. More alarmingly, 

some large states like, UP, MP, Orissa 

and Bihar have tele-densities of only 

one per cent to two per cent. 

Although India has a TV penetration 

of nearly eight per cent, the PC penetration 

is only 0.54 per cent. The total 

Internet subscriber base is less than 

four million. Urban tele-density is 

close to the global average, but there is 

a wide variation between urban and 

rural tele-densities, and sharp regional 

variations as well. Globally, the 

North is more developed than the 

South, but in India, it is the other way 

round. Universal access and 

Universal Services will require large 

funds and massive efforts by all the 

states. 

In the USA, where universal services 

consists of support to high cost areas, 

low-income subscribers, rural health 

care, schools, and libraries, household 

penetration is more than 90 per cent. 

Even in such a situation, in 2002, the 

USAs funding for Universal Services 

was $5.9 billion. In India, the total 

funds available until the end of the 

10th Five-Year Universal Services 

Plan are projected to be in the region 

of $2 billion. 

While reforms and competition in the 

telecom sector has led to a rapid 

growth of the network and sharp 

reduction in tariff, they have also 

squeezed Average Revenue Per User 

(ARPU). However, the growth in subscriber 

base and consequently the 

increase in traffic will lead to 

enhanced revenue volumes and thereby 

protect profitability. An innovative 

approach will be needed to attract the 

new subscribers. 

The myth that cellular services will be 

offered only in metropolitan and 

urban areas has been exploded. The 

incumbent has already provided 

access to Mofossil areas and increased 

the subscriber base substantially to 

achieve critical mass. With a tele-density 

of only six per cent, there is a huge 

potential market. With the telecom 

and information technology industry 

in doldrums in the developed countries, 

India—with rates of growth second 

only to China—should be a major 

destination for new investments. 

Since tariffs have already gone down, 

further commoditisation of services 

may not be significant. However, 

building brand image through 

improved and innovative value added 

services in a converged environment, 

improved customer care, and content 

development will become increasingly 

dominant. 

The ongoing vertical and horizontal 

integration of the sector will consolidate 

the sector. Accordingly, four or 

five major players will provide most of 

the services countrywide. 

The proposed unified licence regime 

will facilitate the convergence of services 

and the synergetic consolidation 

of the sector. In the urban areas, 

broadband services will become 

increasingly available through new 

wireless technologies and through up 

grading of the existing wire-line network. 

In a technologically neutral 

regime, robustness, scalability, and 

affordability will be the key factors 

driving down costs. This may well 

encourage "competitive cooperation" 

and sharing of the infrastructure in 

the best interest of the users. 

With the telecom sector poised for 

higher growth rates, it should be possible 

to exceed the 10th Five-year Plan 

11.5 per cent tele-density target. In 

fact, the NTP 99 target of 7 per cent 

tele-density by 2005 and 15 per cent 

by 2010 will be more than exceeded. 

However, one of the prime concerns is 

to ensure accessibility and availability 

of telecom services in areas that would 

not otherwise be commercially viable. 

In a vast country like India, with low 

penetration of communication facilities, 

opportunities will arise continuously 

to promote the telecom sector 

and create an environment for facilitating 

growth in other sectors. 

In short, India: 

ˆ Has the fifth largest telecom network 

in the world; 

ˆ Is the second largest telecom market 

in the world, next to China; 

ˆ Has over 80 million telephones and 

more than 46 millions cell phones; 

ˆ Adds 2 million new phones per 

month; 

ˆ Requires an investment of US$ 70 

billion to meet its 15 per 100 tele-density 

target by 2010. 

We welcome your 

comments ... 

If you have any 

comments or opinions about 

India, 

a Giant on the March 

we would like 

to hear from you. 

Simply complete the reply 

card and fax it back to our 

editorial team. 

Fax no: 

+44 20 7474 0900 

or send an email to 

editorial@connect-world.com 

11


Indias intellectual capital its neural network 

by Dr Jon Earith, Chief Technology Officer, MBT 

India is transforming itself, and the nations economy, through the exploitation of its intellectual 

capital, is building upon education to drive the country from service provider to 

innovator and technological leader. Indian companies have long offered IT services internationally. 

At first, they provided coders for western software, but, over time, added genuine 

expertise in design and consultancy. Today, companies in search of overall value look 

to Indian offshore partnerships for the distinctive skills and high performance they offer. 

Dr Jon Earith is MBTs Chief Technical Officer. Before MBT, Jon held senior positions at IBM Global 

Services, Sema, Cable and Wireless and BT where, working at Syntegra, he led the UK systems and consultancy 

integration team. Subsequently, Dr Earith founded Telecoms Consultants and Management Ltd one of 

the UKs leading independent Telecoms consultancy companies. 

Jon obtained a PhD from Nottingham University. Dr Eariths research focused on fibre optic communications 

and culminated in the design and installation of the first long haul system in the UK. Dr Earith, an 

engineer and MBA as well, has had extensive overseas experience in North America, Brazil, Asia, India and 

China. 

Over the last fifteen to twenty years, 

India has taken great strides forward 

in terms of business development, by 

increasingly opening up to the outside 

world, encouraging foreign investment 

and economic reform. 

Looking to the future, optimism about 

the countrys continuing success on 

the global stage is fuelled by a growing 

recognition of one of its greatest 

strengths — the depth of its intellectual 

capital. 

One way to understand this is to consider 

the advanced computing technique, 

known as artificial intelligence, 

which models the electronic 

brain on the human one—on the neural 

network. 

In computing, such networks, which 

often deploy Bayesian and other techniques 

to replicate human intellectual 

processing, have enormous power. 

One could argue that, in todays India, 

there is such power—an entirely 

human neural network, a rapidly 

developing organism, dependent upon 

people who are both highly educated 

and highly motivated. That power is 

delivering a growing competitive 

advantage to India, generating 

increasingly rich and rare skill sets 

and nurturing new intellectual property. 

Educational empowerment 

Gandhi said: "The purpose of education 

is to bring out the best in you." 

The Indian philosophy of 

Upanishadas makes it clear that education 

is much more than the transference 

of knowledge; it is the development 

of character. 

The goal of education is not to create 

individuals who can reiterate todays 

knowledge, but to empower them to 

describe new solutions to new challenges. 

That is precisely what is happening in 

India and the result is a transformation 

in the nations economy, through 

the exploitation of intellectual capital. 

It is driving the country from service 

provider to innovator and technological 

leader. 

As far back as the late 1970s and early 

1980s, Indian companies offered IT 

services internationally. Back in those 

days it was simply bodyshopping; providing 

coders to implement western 

software designs. Indian work proved 

reliable and significantly lower-cost 

than the home resource. 

Nevertheless, you cannot build a longterm 

business — or a nations prosperity 

— on price. Someone else will 

always undercut you. The price 

13


advantage in any market will always 

move, like water, to the lowest-cost 

resource. So the secret for long-term 

success is not to aim for a low price, 

but to deliver good value for money. If 

the value proposition is right, the price 

can rise and we all benefit. 

From price to value 

This was the course of the Indian IT 

industry. It has built on its value-forthe-money 

coding and added genuine, 

world-class expertise in design and 

consultancy, not least by anticipating 

the needs of global businesses and 

developing skills in advance. 

A recent McKinsey Quarterly report 

confirmed that, today, leading US 

companies in the financial sector and 

other industries create offshore partnerships 

to achieve far more than 

cost-reduction; they are taking advantage 

of the distinctive skills and high 

performance on offer. That is, they 

are in search of value overall. 

The report further quantifies the 

nature of this competitive advantage: 

"Most leading Indian IT outsourcing 

firms operate at level five—the highest 

degree of expertise—of the IT service 

capability maturity model (CMM)." 

Most internal IT departments, by contrast, 

in the United States have 

reached levels two and three. 

As a result, according to the Ministry 

of Communications and Information 

Technology, the Indian IT and ITES 

(Information Technology Enabled 

Services) industries are expected to 

achieve exports of US$13 billion in 

2003/4. India, today, is the worlds 

service provider. Its global market 

share in off shore services stands at 24 

per cent and the government 

predicts revenues 

of US$148 billion 

by 2012, a staggering 

figure. Can this be 

achieved 

Commitment to 

change 

Through a continuation 

of the process, 

which has driven the 

educational structure 

over the last 30 years it 

can be achieved. That 

is, by reaping the benefit 

of Indias intellectual 

capital. Indias colleges 

and universities 

produce three million 

graduates a year, of 

“The goal of education is 

not to create individuals 

who can reiterate 

today’s knowledge, but 

to empower them to 

describe new solutions 

to new challenges.” 

who 520,000 qualify in IT subjects, 

largely from educational institutions 

rated very highly on a global standard. 

That has not happened by accident; 

educational authorities, at every level, 

have responded to the calls of industry 

and have adjusted curricula to developing 

needs. Today, Indias education 

system is adapting as rapidly as the 

changing global business environment 

— a process rarely matched by its competitors. 

The companies that drive Indias IT 

success demonstrate their commitment 

to raising general education 

standards by investing heavily to 

recruit the right staff, but this is 

enlightened self-interest. 

Many Indian-based IT companies 

staff, for example, include a high percentage 

with masters degrees or doctorates, 

19 per cent and two per cent 

respectively, in my own companys 

case. 

Enlightened self-interest continues 

after hiring. There are induction programmes, 

ongoing training, personal 

and leadership development and 

active encouragement to add further 

formal qualifications. 

Figure 1: Ongoing education is a key element in the Indian sector. 

A key element of this process is to 

integrate the employee into the corporate 

culture, thus building team work 

and a strong sense of customer loyalty. 

Programmes of this sort, naturally, 

build on the strengths of the Indian 

character, because this is at the core of 

the Indian IT proposition. There is a 

strong organisational/business focus 

but, more broadly, the staff acquires 

general interpersonal and behavioural 

skills and all the other attributes necessary 

to work globally. 

Necessarily, since Indian IT today is 

inherently outward facing, its software 

exports represent no less than 79 per 

cent of sales. Moreover, the critical 

success factor in its move from 

bodyshop to partner lies in comprehending 

not only technical requirements 

but also, across styles and cultures, 

the way in which client companies 

operate. 

Active encouragement of education 

and development continues throughout 

the employees career. Most major 

Indian IT companies, for example, 

have formed alliances with leading 

educational establishments around 

the world. 

Skills and value 

This process is about far more than 

formal qualifications. Indian IT has 

won widespread international market 

respect by reacting fast to changing 

situations and developing human 

resources to match. 

Illustratively, the use of Siebel software 

to create sophisticated customer 

relationship management systems 

emerged several years ago as a major 

trend. It provides all the tools necessary 

for leading edge 

solutions. However, the 

problem is, there is a 

world shortage of consultants 

with sufficient 

knowledge in depth to 

be able to specify, design 

and implement such 

systems. As demand 

has soared, Indias neural 

network has been 

well placed to exploit the 

opportunity. 

This trend is paralleled 

across the COTS 

(Customised Off The 

Shelf packages) sector, 

as major telecommunications 

customers seek 

to changeover old legacy 

and proprietary formats. 

Other examples 

14

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15


Figure 2: Indian IT is a worldwide business. 

of such rare COTS skill-sets include 

Geneva, in billing and Clarify in CRM 

and BEA. In each case, an opportunity 

is created. 

Education for life 

In the West, lifetime education has 

become a fashionable talking point. 

Leading management writers have 

waxed lyrical about aspects of the subject 

from the learning organisation to 

knowledge management. Still, success 

is, as yet, comparatively rare. Yet 

in India, it is a reality, fundamental to 

corporate culture and embraced by 

workforces. 

Employee surveys across the IT industry 

report routinely that staff place 

such culture at the top of their 

requirements, alongside more obvious 

factors such as pay and rewards, and 

the international opportunities afforded 

by the IT world. It is often the educational 

opportunity, which becomes 

the critical decision-making factor. 

This mutual commitment is reflected 

in staff loyalty. The average rate of 

employee attrition in the Indian IT 

industry is about 15 per cent; in 

Europe comparable employers expect 

double the churn. The staff tell their 

friends and family they are happy, too. 

In fact, the buddy system is a primary 

recruitment source. The policy of continuous 

development of staff is 

matched by a steady rise in corporate 

standards. Most Indian IT companies 

operating globally are certified to 

international quality standards like 

CMM and ISO 9000, a further testament 

of seriousness. 

are now prime contractors 

for bluechip 

businesses 

worldwide. They 

provide innovative 

design skills as well 

as cost-effective 

coding. Rather 

than just react, they 

lead and benefit 

from staff members 

who are respected 

at every level. 

In December 2003, 

the Ministry of 

Communications 

and Information 

Technology reported 

that, 

"Maintaining Indias momentum and 

share of this global opportunity will 

depend on its ability to create and 

make available a growing and appropriately 

skilled pool of talent. While 

India is well positioned today, high 

growth aspirations demand that adequate 

actions be taken to ensure that 

supply-side constraints do not prevent 

us from realising the potential of the 

opportunity." 

True, India cannot rest, but its opportunity 

is great. Continuously higher 

investment in its burgeoning neural 

network benefits all — whether 

employed in the IT industry or not. 

A better developed workforce will 

enable Indian IT to increase its penetration 

of the world market, enhancing 

financial returns for its companies, 

their staff, and the wider community. 

Then too, the benefit extends globally. 

As Indias participation in, and contribution 

to, the world economy grows 

apace India is playing its own substantial 

part in global growth. Collectively, 

these represent rich dividends for 

Indias commitment over the past two 

decades and are a testament to the 

strength of its neural network, but 

this, perhaps, is only the beginning. 

www.connect-world.com 

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makers’ forum for 

ICT driven development 

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world. 

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at 

Beyond bodyshopping 

So Indian IT today is moving far 

beyond its bodyshopping roots, to a 

situation where its leading companies 


16


From tortoise to hare: 

the transformation of Indian telecom 

by Dr Arun Mehta, Chief Technical Officer, Net Radiophony India 

Government controlled Department of Telecommunications or DOT was Indias primary 

supplier of phone services and its telecom regulator. When India opened its market, private 

companies had little choice in the technologies they could use; DOT could use anything. 

New entrants paid high licence fees; DOT paid none. To level the field and attract 

investors, a regulatory agency—TRAI—was established, but court battles, and DOTs resistance, 

defeated its efforts. A special court now handles telecom disputes and the sector is 

growing. 

Dr Arun Mehta is currently the Chief Technical Officer of Net Radiophony, India; a Director of Kaleidoscope 

Private Limited a film and TV production company and the President of the Society for Telecommunications 

Empowerment (STEM), which seeks to bring the benefits of modern telecommunications to the poor. Dr 

Mehta, an electrical engineer and computer scientist is also a high profile social activist, an ex-President of 

the Indian Section of Amnesty International and was the co-host of a weekly IT news programme. The 

multi-talented Dr Mehta, a consultant to firms and organisations, large and small, for many years is the 

author of eLocutor, a system to meet the communication needs of Professor Stephen Hawking. Arun Meta 

studied and taught in India the US and Germany. Dr Mehta earned his Doctorate from Ruhr University, 

Germany, a MS in Computer Science from the State University of New York and a Bachelor of Technology 

in Electrical Engineering (First Class with Distinction) from IIT Delhi. He speaks Hindi, English, German, 

and French. 

At the start of the 1990s, telecommunications 

was a government monopoly. 

The Department of Telecommunications 

(DOT) was the sole supplier of phone 

connections in the country, except in 

Delhi and Mumbai, where MTNL, also 

totally government controlled, was the 

supplier. International communications 

was the preserve of VSNL, also a 

government-owned entity. Together, 

they constituted what might be called 

the DOT family. In a country with a 

population of almost a billion, there 

were just 5.1 million phone lines in 

1990 — roughly one for every 200 people. 

The DOT made telecom policy, 

implemented it, and acted as the regulator. 

A phone was considered a luxury, 

so those who used theirs a lot were 

charged at a higher rate. 

Around this time, the Indian state 

neared bankruptcy, and was even 

forced to sell some of its gold reserves 

to stay afloat. Rapid liberalisation and 

the dismantling of state monopolies 

was not just a path to faster economic 

growth, but also of quickly refilling the 

state coffers. 

In 1994, the National Telecom Policy 

was announced, which allowed the 

private sector to bid for licenses in different 

states. The DOT, an entity 

directly threatened by this, was put in 

charge of formulating and implementing 

this policy. The policy did not 

address key questions essential for the 

private sector to function in this area, 

including those of rights of way to lay 

cables, and spectrum allocation for 

wireless communications. The over 

enthusiasm of the private sector for 

what it saw as boundless possibilities 

for growth in a telecommunicationsstarved 

country led it to bid absurdly 

high sums for licenses. The combination 

was a sure recipe for disaster. 

By 1999, it was clear that the licence 

fee regime was not working and an 

alternative had to be found. The problems 

with changing the terms of the 

licence arrangement midstream were 

several: besides questions regarding 

the propriety of providing relief to 

large and rich multinationals, there 

was also the question of the reaction of 

losing parties in the licence bidding, 

who could legitimately feel aggrieved 

for being punished for having bid 

responsibly. In an admission that the 

DOT could not be relied upon to come 

up with workable policy, a taskforce 

called the Group on Telecom (GoT) 

was set up to formulate a new telecom 

policy. 

A complicated scheme for migration 

to a revenue-sharing arrangement was 

announced, under which the telecom 

companies had to still pay a share of 

their overdue licence fees. 

17


Apart from blunders in the 

licensing process, telecom 

growth in the country was 

hampered by the authoritarian 

attitude of the DOT 

with regard to choice of 

technology. While private 

companies had almost no 

choice in what technologies 

they might adopt, the 

DOT family had complete 

freedom in technology 

selection. It was only in 

1999 that these e-mail 

service providers were 

grudgingly allowed to 

migrate to TCP-IP. 

The same guidelines 

imposed a starting licence 

fee of Rs. 25 to 50 lakhs per annum on 

e-mail service providers. Bulletin 

Board Service (BBS) operators, typically 

run by students who allowed 

users to dial into their computers and 

leave messages for each other, were 

asked to pay an amazing Rs. 15 lakhs 

per year for permission to run a free 

service! VSNL paid no licence fees for 

a service that offered far more than 

just e-mail. 

Similarly, cellular operators were 

forced to use GSM technology, 

although cheaper alternatives might 

have been far more popular in a poor 

country. When MTNL started to offer 

mobile telephony, it was not bound by 

this restriction, and chose Code 

Division Multiple Access (CDMA) 

technology. 

A wireless local loop system called 

corDECT, which reduced the cost of 

connecting a new subscriber to the 

telephone network from Rs. 35,000 in 

urban areas and Rs. 75,000 in rural 

areas to a figure close to Rs. 10,000 

could not be used. While only one per 

cent of the population could afford 

conventional technology without cross 

subsidies, the cheaper corDect technology 

could have been within reach 

of 15-20 per cent of the countrys population. 

Yet, DOT dragged its feet in 

providing wireless and other clearances. 

Another grievous technology choice 

made by the government was the ban 

on Internet telephony, another means 

of low-cost telecom access. VSNL 

even blocked access to Internet sites 

offering information on the technology. 

Internet telephony and corDECT technology 

were both eminently suited to a 

new paradigm for telecommunications. 

Instead, similar to the Internet 

model, a large number of small to 

Figure 1: Cables became a problematic issue. 

medium players could connect to 

national and international optic-fibre 

backbones, but the DOT recipe for privatisation 

only allowed large players, 

since each needed to be in a position 

to cater to a circle, typically an entire 

state. 

Besides the high licence fees, private 

operators faced other problems. It 

took them many months to get spectrum 

clearance to use wireless. 

Spectrum allocation was (and still is) a 

terrible mess in the country; the available 

spectrum had been parcelled out 

to several government departments 

and ministries, each of which managed 

the spectrum in its own domain. 

“Internet telephony and 

corDECT technology 

were both eminently 

suited to a new paradigm 

for telecommunications.” 

Anyone wanting clearance to use wireless 

also needed clearance from 

dozens of government departments. 

This forced each department to manage 

the spectrum in their bands, which 

they were not equipped to handle. 

In other countries, information pertaining 

to all broadcasting antennae is 

fed into a single computer program. 

Anyone wishing to use wireless provides 

information pertaining to the 

antenna, direction, height, power, frequency, 

etc., which is also fed into the 

computer program, which then clearly 

indicates whether or not this new 

antenna would interfere with existing 

equipment. 

While departments made wasteful use 

of spectrum, by far the worst culprits 

were the defence services. 

All over the world, defence 

services do occupy large segments 

of spectrum. To 

bring this in check, the 

NATO countries have uniformly 

adopted the so-called 

NATO Band. that allows 

equipment from different 

countries to inter-operate. 

India purchases equipment 

both, from NATO and non- 

NATO countries, and therefore 

uses far more spectrum 

than other countries. 

Other government departments 

are also blocking 

more spectrum than needed 

because of past indiscriminate 

purchases of non-standard 

equipment. This approach cost 

the government the substantial revenues 

it could be earning from spectrum 

fees. 

If wireless was hard to use, laying 

cables was no simple task for the private 

operator either: "The National 

Highways Authority of India (NHAI) 

demanded it be paid Rs. 75,000 per 

km if the cables were being laid along 

the nation highways the DOT pays 

only reinstatement chargesa fraction 

of this in each case, the operators 

had two choices — petition the government 

and wait out the delays, or just 

bribe the authorities." 

It was hoped that the formation of the 

Telecom Regulatory Authority of India 

(TRAI) in 1997 would increase the 

confidence level of the private operators. 

TRAI was established to regulate, 

oversee and promote competition 

and growth in telecom. 

The substantial investment needed for 

growth, about 50 billion dollars in the 

next five years, is beyond the governments 

or DOTs fiscal capacity and 

has to come mostly from private and 

foreign sources. 

These investors need to be assured of 

a level playing field and a pro-competitive 

regime. Hence, the need for a 

credible and strong independent regulator, 

to enable new entrants to compete 

against a giant government 

owned incumbent that owns the existing 

network. 

The Telecom Regulatory Authority 

was established, as well, to prevent 

anti-competitive behaviour such as 

cross-subsidies, establish terms for 

non-discriminatory interconnection, 

administer universal service obligations, 

and transparently administer 

licensing, radio frequency allocations, 

18

P o l i s h Y o u r C o n n e c t i o n s 

Broadband and Content: 

From Wires to Wireless 

16 –19 January 2005 

Hilton Hawaiian Village 

Beach Resort & Spa 

Honolulu, Hawaii USA 

Program Themes 

• The Value of Content 

• Transformational Applications 

• New Approaches to Development Issues 

• New Technologies 

• Mobile Applications and Users 

• Access 

• Security and Privacy 

• Predicting Demand 

• Global Networks 

• Regulatory Issues 

• Whither Plain Old Telephone Service 

(POTS) 

•Enabling Change 

PTC’05 Conference 

PTC’05 will be a milestone conference 

addressing key shifts in telecommunications 

as the issue of broadband availability gives 

way to content, access and use. The PTC’05 

conference will focus on the value of content 

in broadband networks, the market forces that 

drive demand for content, the players positioning 

for new revenue opportunities — and 

the rising importance of content delivery over 

mobile networks. 

Call for Participation 

Anyone interested in the critical issues facing 

the future of telecommunications should 

actively participate in PTC’05! Seize this 

golden opportunity and maximize your total 

participation in PTC’05: 

• Register Early & Save 

• Sponsor, Exhibit & Advertise 

• Full Time Student Volunteer Opportunities 

PTC members enjoy a 40% discount on the 

conference fee. If you are not a PTC member 

and are interested in joining, please email 

Justin Riel at justin@ptc.org. 

For more information, visit: 

www.ptc05.org 

For detailed information on PTC’05, visit www.ptc05.org 

Pacific Telecommunications Council 2454 South Beretania St., 3rd Floor, Honolulu, HI 96826 www.ptc.org Tel: +1.808.941.3789 Fax: +1.808.944.4874 E-mail: ptc05@ptc.org


“TRAI was established to 

regulate, oversee, and 

promote competition 

and growth in telecom.” 

rights of way and telephone numbering 

plans. 

However, this body was tainted from 

the start: not only was it rather weak 

in the powers conferred on it by the 

TRAI Act, it was also largely staffed 

by officers on short-term deputation 

from the DOT family — the very 

organisations it was meant to oversee. 

Yet, so blatant was DOTs intention 

to rule the roost, that TRAI very 

quickly got into a turf battle with the 

DOT and MTNL. It stopped a DOT 

bid to cash in the bank guarantees of 

six cellular operators who had not 

paid licence fees, and in 1998, it prevented 

MTNL from entering the cellular 

market and ruled DOTs 

Internet policy invalid. 

The government operators took the 

matters to the Delhi High Court, 

which ruled later that year that the 

regulator did not have jurisdiction 

over the DOTs licensing powers, and 

threw open private entry into 

Internet services. 

The government attempted to clarify 

the TRAIs function, but after the 

High Court judgement, the TRAI was 

left with a single thankless task, setting 

tariffs. 

various political stratagems to block 

it. 

Finally, in 2000, the government disbanded 

the TRAI and appointed a 

new body in its place, which it divested 

of judicial powers. These were 

handed over to a telecom disputes 

settlement and appellate tribunal. 

This was followed by a spate of 

improvements in the competitive 

environment. National and international 

long distance services were 

opened up to competition in 2002, 

and the license conditions for basic 

services improved. The Tatas and 

Reliance came in with major investment 

after this, based on CDMA 

technology. There was a bitter dispute 

with cellular telephony 

providers, who felt that basic services 

providers were able to offer more or 

less an equivalent service, at far better 

licence conditions and lengthy litigation 

followed. 

Finally, towards the end of 2003, a 

unified licence was introduced, and 

the dispute finally laid to rest. As a 

consequence, "From a single operator 

and the lowest tele-density in the 

world we now have multiple operators, 

several technologies, at least 30 

pre and post-paid tariff packages, not 

less than 300 models of handsets 

cellular tariffs dropped by over 90 

per cent since May 1999, a feat 

unparalleled by any other sector or 

industry." 

India had 14.17 million mobile phone 

subscribers at the end of May 2003, 

102.8 per cent more than at the end 

of the same month in 2002. The 

number of mobile phone users is 

expected to surge to 120 million by 

2008, making the sector one of the 

hottest markets for global telecom 

majors facing low demand in 

Western countries. 




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Figure 2: A unified licence was finally 

introduced in 2003. 

Here too, it met controversy every 

step of the way. It had court battles 

with MTNL on tariff issues pertaining 

to its mobile phone service, and 

when it tried to reduce the subsidy 

that long-distance services were providing 

to local traffic, the DOT used 

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20


Networking Indias Interior 

by Venkat Kedlaya, Managing Director, Convergent Communications, India 

The interior of India, as in remote regions throughout the world, is far behind the countrys 

urban areas in the use of ICTs. Many government programmes, often in cooperation with 

NGOs and private interests, are working to bridge this gap. Information kiosks, where the 

rural population can access the Internet, for governmental, healthcare, educational, financial 

and other services have been successful. Building the infrastructure, providing wireless 

connectivity, developing local language content and applications and making it affordable 

have been a challenge. 

Venkat Kedlaya is the Managing Director of Convergent Communications India Pvt. Ltd, located in 

Bangalore, India. Before joining Convergent, Mr Kedlaya served as the General Manager of Motorola 

Information Systems Groups Networking division in South Asia and as Director of Motorolas transmission 

products group in Hong Kong. Previously, Mr Kedlaya worked as the Product Engineering Manager at 

Modi Xerox, as a Project manager with Rank Xerox UK, as Project manager with International Power 

Semiconductors and as project engineer at the Radar Project Centre in Mumbai. Venkat Kedlaya currently 

heads the Southern Region Committee of MAIT, an IT industry organisation in India. 

Mr Kedlaya earned his MSc in electronics and M Tech in Electronics from the Indian Institute of Technology, 

Mumbai, completed the management programme at Ashridge College in England and attended the Centre 

for Creative Leadership at Greensboro US. 

It is a fact that Information 

Technology (IT) is playing an important 

role in all issues concerning 

human life, be it social, economic or 

political. Today, IT does not effectively 

exist without the network, and 

ICT—Information Communication 

Technology—is a better description. 

India can be divided into urban, semiurban 

and rural areas. Urban areas 

are the metropolitan cosmopolitan 

cities and state capitals. Semi-urban 

areas are the towns at district headquarters. 

Rural areas are the villages 

in a district. 

In urban areas of India, ICT, the connectivity 

infrastructure for backhaul 

and access, Internet reach, applications 

and services are growing fast. 

The presence of multiple telecom, 

mobile, and Internet service providers 

has brought enormous benefits to the 

urban community, contributed to the 

urban life style and to industrial efficiency 

and is helping meet the growing 

needs of society. 

In the interior, though, the communication 

infrastructure and Internet 

reach is poor, not at all comparable to 

urban areas. This has created a digital 

divide between urban and rural India. 

The digital divide also implies educational, 

health, income, and opportunity 

divides. 

Networking Indias interior 

There have been many initiatives in 

recent past to bridge the divide in different 

pockets of the country including: 

ˆ eSeva, Integrated Citizen Services, 

in Andhra Pradesh; 

ˆ Lok Mitra and Jan Mitra Projects 

from Rajasthan; 

ˆ e-BillPost and e- Post Services of 

the Department of Posts; 

ˆ RASI (Rural Access to Services 

through the Internet) earlier called 

SARI and n- Logue Communications; 

ˆ Gyandoot—Rural Intranet project— 

Madhyapradesh; 

ˆ Community Information Centres 

(CIC) Project (Dept. of Info Tech., 

Govt.of India) in North Eastern 

region; 

ˆ Bhoomi —Land Record Digitisation 

project—Karnataka; 

ˆ ITC eChoupal — project by ITCs 

international business division, to 

establish efficient agricultural supply 

chain; 

ˆ Kuppam i- community, project by 

Hewlett Packard, Andhra Pradesh, 

The technology incubator and hub at 

21


Kuppam set out to deliver programmes 

in education, healthcare and 

e-governance to develop low-cost 

products for emerging markets; 

ˆ Akshaya- Kerala Govt’s Hundred 

Per cent ICT Literacy Project; 

ˆ Information Village Research 

Project- IVRP by M. S. Swaminathan 

Foundation; 

ˆ GRAMDOOT—Project in Jaipur by 

Aksh broadband Ltd; 

ˆ Pravara Village IT Project (PRA- 

GATI) — 7 lane IT development project. 

ICT for womens empowerment 

ˆ Community Radio—Deccan 

Development Society; 

ˆ Community Radio—Kutch Mahila 

Vikas Sangathan (KMVS); 

ˆ Sisu Samrakshak ICT—enabled 

Child health care by UNICEF; 

ˆ hange Initiatives—Nabanna- 

Empowering women 94; 

ˆ SEWA. 

Bridging the divide 

There are unique features in every 

project, but they share many features. 

Information Kiosks are the access 

points for the villagers. Typically a 

Kiosk consists of one or more PCs, 

Printers, Web Cameras and communication 

equipment (modem or wireless 

equipment). Depending upon the 

services offered, one might find low 

cost ATMs, finger print authentication 

devices, telephones, etc. The kiosks, 

mostly run by local entrepreneurs, 

typically provide one or more of the 

following services: 

ˆ Internet access; 

ˆ Rural Services—contract farming, 

medicinal plant promotion, organic 

farming advice; 

ˆ E-Governance Services—Jobs related 

to District Administration, application 

processing; 

ˆ Trading services—Selling and buying 

of agricultural goods and handicrafts; 

ˆ Outsourcing jobs—Data entry jobs; 

ˆ Tele-consultancy (from district head 

quarters to the client at kiosk)—health 

care, agricultural advice, animal husbandry; 

ˆ Urban Services in Rural Areas—telecom 

services (cash cards, new connections 

etc.), travel services (railway & 

bus reservations), financial services 

(insurance, vehicle financing, cash, 

transfers, courier, etc.); 

ˆ Telephony services—free emergency 

calls, local telephone calls; 

ˆ Community radio broadcasting 

services. 

Business models for digital inclusion 

Business models play a vital role in the 

success or failure of these projects. 

Currently, the most accepted model is 

Figure 1: Finger print authentication 

device 

built upon partnerships between private 

and public organisations like government, 

NGOs, technology partners, 

industries, finance organisations and, 

importantly, local entrepreneurs. 

One successful project, in a remote 

place called Pravaranagar, 

Ahmednagar district in Maharashtra 

state, serves as an example. Promoted 

by National Informatics Centre (NIC) 

of the Ministry of Information 

Technology, the PRAGATI project 

connected one hundred villages, with 

a population of more than 250 thousand, 

using a combination of fixed 

Figure 2: Low cost rural ATM. 

telephone and wireless Wide Area 

Networking (WWAN) technology. 

Today, reliable Internet and Intranet 

is now available. The ICT infrastructure 

improved the quality of life of the 

rural population. The seven-lane programme 

is helping the villages by 

establishing local IT centres, disseminating 

information regarding government 

schemes, helping market agricultural 

products, making healthcare 

available, and providing access to education, 

agro processing and economic 

development. 

The benefits are many; the project 

links all high schools in 50 villages 

within a radius of 10 km and lets 

teachers and staff stay in touch with 

the regional school administration, 

helps introduce modern teaching 

methods, including computer-based, 

virtual school, learning at hours convenient 

for children who work during 

the day. 

Students at professional colleges can 

acquire knowledge using the Internet 

that will help them find new jobs. 

Farmers communicate with the agricultural 

experts and learn new farming 

techniques and better ways of storing 

and packing their products for 

marketing. Village health care professionals 

consult specialists at Medical 

Colleges and Hospitals about specialised 

treatment or for on-site information 

about emergency care. 

People can interact with appropriate 

government officials without leaving 

their village to obtain information 

about social welfare programs - this is 

of particular benefit to rural women. 

Challenges, issues and concerns 

Building an ICT infrastructure in 

Indias interior is a challenge. ICT 

infrastructure has three key components 

namely, connectivity infrastructure, 

content and applications, and 

end-user devices. 

Connectivity infrastructure — An 

Internet point-of-presence is normally 

available at district head quarters, but 

district-wide access is a challenge. 

Dial-up telecom services are a simple 

solution used in many projects. Since 

these are not always available or reliable, 

wireless technologies are preferred. 

Standard Wi-Fi LAN and 

related technologies are mostly used 

but some projects use indigenous 

WLL technology. Nevertheless, lineof-sight, 

antenna site and regulatory 

issues persist. 

Content and Applications—India is a 

country with many languages. 

Content and applications should be in 

the local language to benefit the user 

communities. Localised content 

development, a major challenge, is 

being addressed. 

End-user devices—The cost and 

affordability of end-user devices is a 

major issue. The user computers and 

the software must be economical. 

That is why most of the applications 

are developed using open-source software 

like Linux. 

There are other issues as well, such as 

the lack of skilled manpower to run 

the show, unreliable power supplies 

that make it necessary to have alternate 

energy sources (solar panels, generators, 

etc.), and finding ways to 

motivate local entrepreneurs to sustain 

the business. 

22


Managed telecommunication services and a vibrant 

economy 

by Thomas White, Senior Vice-President & General Manager, Communications Solutions Group, 

Agilent Technologies 

Indias growth as a global economic power depends in large part upon its telecommunication 

infrastructure and high quality services. Telecom operators need strategies for effective 

network and service management, especially for their highly profitable corporate 

accounts. Corporations, though, want guaranteed quality of service. To deliver world-class 

services, telecom operators need OSS—operational support systems. Systems that collect, 

consolidate, and prioritise information, to present an aggregated, real-time, view of service 

quality for targeted customer accounts are essential. 

Mr Thomas White is senior vice-president and general manager of Agilent Technologies’ Communications 

Solutions Group. 

White’s experience in electrical engineering began in Hewlett-Packard Company’s London offices, where he 

started as a staff engineer in the Test and Measurement sales office. Since then, Mr White has held numerous 

managerial positions in field sales and services as well as in the Manufacturing Divisions in the United 

Kingdom, was promoted to general manager of the Telecoms Systems Division (TSD) in Scotland and then 

general manager of the Computer Peripherals Bristol Division. Mr White was later appointed vice-president 

and general manager of the Communications Solutions Group until his appointment as Agilent’s senior vicepresident 

and general manager, Communications Solutions. Mr White is also Country General Manager for 

Agilent UK Ltd. White was born in Newark, Nottinghamshire, England. Mr White received his bachelor’s 

degree in electrical engineering from Liverpool University. 

Telecommunication networks carry 

the lifeblood of modern enterprises. 

Indias success in becoming a global 

economic power will be determined in 

large part by the countrys ability to 

provide a robust telecommunication 

infrastructure with high quality services. 

Until recently, telecommunications in 

India were a state-run monopoly characterised 

by severely limited deployment 

and coverage, serving less than 

six per cent of the countrys population. 

However, the country has been making 

great strides to catch up to neighbours 

such as China and Malaysia, 

whose economies have benefited from 

the opening of their markets and by 

permitting foreign investment. In 

2004, there has been a flurry of activity 

in Indias telecommunication sector 

as regulatory and policy changes 

encourage domestic and foreign 

investment, competition among players 

intensifies, and the number of subscribers 

has grown by double digit 

rates. Liberalised licensing rules have 

fuelled a boom, particularly in mobile 

communications. 

The Telecom Regulatory Authority of 

India or TRAI (2004), reports that of 

the nearly 4 million subscribers added 

in July and August 2004, close to 90 

per cent were mobile subscribers. 

While these changes are exciting and 

crucial to the countrys development, 

they bring with them the inevitable 

headaches that beset telecom operators: 

increasingly complex operating 

environments, difficult technology 

decisions, and relentless competition 

that spawns price wars and customer 

churn. 

Telecom operators, if they are to 

remain viable, must quickly find and 

nourish a profitable customer base 

while providing support for a national 

economy on the rise. 

Profitable customers are business customersand 

business customers 

demand high quality services. That 

means, in addition to resolving capital 

funding and deployment issues, tele- 

23

The Broadband Show... 

making convergence happen 

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nvergence 

India 2005 

Pragati Maidan, New Delhi, India 

22-24 March 2005 

International Exhibition & Conference 

Incorporating 

Carriers & Telcos 

Broadcast & Cable 

Enterprise Solutions 

Multimedia & Internet 

Networks & Computing 

Mobile Communications 

Customer Premise Equipment 

Satellite & Space Technologies 

Telecommunications Equipment 

Broadband Access Technologies 

Get connected... 

BRINGING Technology Together 

Bringing Technology to BUSINESS 

Co-sponsor 

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Department of Telecommunications 

CABLE OPERATORS 

FEDERATION OF INDIA 

Co-organisers 

Manufacturers 

Association of 

Information Technology 

Government of India 

Ministry of Communications & IT 

Department of Information Technology 

Association of 

Unified Telecom Service 

Providers of India 

Consumer Electronics 

and TV Manufacturers 

Association 

Indo-American 

Chamber of 

Commerce 

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Providers Association 

of India 

Telecom Equipment 

Manufacturers 

Association of India 

Exhibitions India Pvt. Ltd. (An ISO 9001:2000 Certified Company) 

A-17 (2nd Floor) DDA SCO Complex, Near Moolchand Flyover, Defence Colony, New Delhi 110 024, India 

Tel: + 91 11 2463 8680, 5155 2001 Fax: + 91 11 2462 3320, 2463 3506 E-mail: exhibitionsindia@vsnl.com Website: www.convergenceindia.org 

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VSAT Services 

Association 

of India 

Supporting Journal


com operators have to put in place 

strategies for effective network and 

service management. 

Operator situation today 

Operators in India, incumbents as 

well as new players, all have aggressive 

plans for expansion. Whether 

they are laying fibre in the ground or 

putting up towers, they face similar—universal—operational 

challenges. 

Equipment costs are high. The network, 

including the data network used 

for service delivery, control and monitoring, 

was installed over time and 

exists in discrete pockets. 

Equipment and software have been 

procured from dozens of vendors and 

may span multiple generations of 

technology. Providing limited or no 

insight into the performance of the 

network and services, operations cannot 

be managed efficiently to meet the 

market demand. 

Telecom operators in India recognise 

the need for OSS—Operational 

Support Systems. Many today are 

making the transition from the effort 

to get their networks up and running—a 

process that requires significant 

testing and fine-tuning of the network 

elements—to deploying systems 

that monitor the health of the network 

infrastructure, manage the physical 

plant, and automate operational 

processes such as fault detection an 

“Operators in India, 

incumbents as well as 

new players, all have 

aggressive plans for 

expansion.” 

service configuration. The next step is 

implementation of service management 

tools. When telecom operators 

install an OSS that integrates network 

and service management components, 

they gain the ability to deliver worldclass 

services to regional and international 

customers. 

Need for service visibility 

Nearly all businesses of any size 

depend on communication services; 

the traditional fixed-line voice, the 

mobile services that facilitate logistics, 

the servers that host corporate web 

sites and email, and the data networks 

that transport business-to-business 

transactions. Poor service in any of 

these areas means loss of revenue, for 

the business and for the telecom operator 

responsible who, as a result, may 

lose a profitable business account. 

To be most useful, the OSS also should 

contain a service-management component 

that can collect, consolidate, 

and prioritise information, presenting 

an aggregated real-time view of service 

quality for targeted customer 

accounts. 

The service-management component 

will bring order to the chaos that can 

overwhelm a network operations centre 

when different systems in the network 

begin accumulating data and 

sending alarms. In a large network 

operations centre, hundreds or even 

thousands of alarms may be triggered 

during a day. Personnel must find 

answers quickly to some very critical 

questions: Is there an actual service 

problem How does one tell Are customers 

being affected Which ones 

How seriously Should those customers 

be notified 

To provide the answers, the OSS needs 

the ability to: 

ˆ Detect service outages and potential 

threats to services; 

ˆ Correlate incoming alarms and data; 

ˆ Assess the impact of the event that 

triggered the alarm on services and 

customers; 

ˆ Isolate the origin of the problem; 

Figure 1: India, a growing, vibrant economy. 

To obtain a picture of how 

well services are performing 

for customers, telecom 

operators require an OSS 

that can actively test as well 

as passively monitor services. 

Active call testing is perhaps 

the best way to obtain 

service-quality information 

early in a services life cycle, 

before commercial launch 

or during ramp-up when 

service usage is still low. 

Active call testing measures 

the availability and performance 

of services and it 

can be used to emulate the 

experience of customers 

making calls at different 

locations in the network. 

Mobile network operators 

can use active testing to 

check the quality of service 

they are providing their 

own customers, as well as to 

customers of their interconnect 

partners with whom they 

have roaming agreements. 

ˆ Analyse the probable root cause. 

The service-management component 

can tap into the wealth of data contained 

in the network by accessing the 

network monitoring and management 

components. It can, for example, use 

information from the fault management, 

performance management, 

trouble ticketing, active test, networkprobe, 

usage and inventory-provisioning 

systems. 

Data from these multiple sources can 

feed a centralised analysis engine to 

create meaningful, real-time information 

about end-to-end service status. 

Ideally, the OSS will filter out transient 

or isolated events and intelligently 

prioritise service problems, 

making sure that those with the most 

serious consequences for customers 

and the telecom operators business 

are highlighted to be dealt with first. 

Managed enterprise services 

Telecom operators in India who 

deploy broadband data networksfixed-wire 

IP networks today and high 

speed wireless data networks in the 

25


“An automated, real-time 

method of documenting 

and reporting service 

quality–as delivered to 

the customer–is essential.” 

future - are able to offer managed 

enterprise services such as virtual private 

networks (VPNs). 

Managed services are a good way to 

increase revenue and maintain an 

edge with sophisticated corporate customers. 

Corporate accounts contribute 

by far the most revenue per 

subscriber; however, they come with 

strings attached. Before corporations 

entrust critical business functions to a 

telecom operator, they want guarantees 

that service quality expectations 

will be met. The operator, therefore, 

must be able to document service 

quality as experienced by each customer 

and customer account. 

Most OSS solutions are network or 

service oriented, but lack the ability to 

measure the experience of individual 

subscribers and aggregate the results 

for a specified group. One approach to 

doing this is to link data from subscriber 

service usage records (SURs) 

and IP data records (IPDRs) compiled 

from network probes. This data 

becomes the basis for a high-level, 

real-time scorecard that presents critical 

customer requirements along with 

access to more granular layers of 

information. 

The customer-experience measures 

used by the OSS uncover problems 

typically not identified through traditional 

monitoring. For example, a 

mis-configured firewall could prevent 

a customer from using a VPN service. 

The error would not be flagged as a 

“If India continues to 

push for open markets 

and capital investment, 

there is no reason why 

they cannot create a 

robust infrastructure carrying 

the most advanced 

services.” 

network or service problem though it 

greatly impacts the customers ability 

to do business. 

In addition to providing critical information 

to network and service troubleshooters, 

the OSS should notify 

account managers of the steps being 

taken to resolve any problems that 

occur with a managed service. The 

account manager can then convey 

information to the customer as appropriate 

to prevent unpleasant surprises. 

Customer-care representatives should 

also be alerted so that they can handle 

incoming calls. Access to finegrained, 

detailed data at this point 

helps them qualify and route reported 

problems. 

An automated, real-time method of 

documenting and reporting service 

quality—as delivered to the customer—is 

essential. This would go a 

long way toward enhancing a particular 

telecom operators attractiveness 

to the corporate world. 

Looking to the future 

Although it appears that India will not 

soon need high levels of technology to 

support advanced data services, that 

view may well be shortsighted. Even 

though the vast majority of Indians do 

not yet have basic telephone service, 

the 40 — 49 per cent reported growth 

rate of mobile subscribers suggests 

that the consumer market is growing 

quickly. More importantly, reliable 

telecommunication services are essential 

to the success of many of Indias 

growth sectors, including banking, 

shipping, travel and tourism, to name 

a few. 

Entrepreneurs have launched the first 

voice over IP (VoIP) telephony services, 

and the cost for VoIP calls has been 

dropping rapidly. Western corporations 

are notoriously relocating their 

call centres to India, relying on the 

countrys ability to deliver an appropriate 

quality of voice and data services. 

If India continues to push for open 

markets and capital investment, there 

is no reason why they cannot create a 

robust infrastructure carrying the 

most advanced services. This will provide 

vital support for the growing, 

vibrant, Indian economy. Telecom 

service management is one investment 

that can help achieve this goal. 




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26


ICT and New India 

by Mr Sudhir Rao, Managing Director, Bartronics India Limited 

Today, due to governmental programmes over the years, every Indian can talk to anyone 

throughout the world. With mobile telephony, Indias people can keep in touch while on 

the move. India is now part of the always connected world. After the technology revolution 

of the 1990s, Indian software engineers are working in large corporations around the 

globe. Every new technology is available in India within days, and newer, better, more productive 

business processes are used in every sphere of business. 

Mr Sudhir Rao is the Managing Director of Bartronics India Limited. Mr Rao joined Bartronics to establish 

and lead its marketing. He was later named Chief Operating Officer and then Managing Director. Before 

joining Bartronics, Mr Rao spearheaded the Indian operations of a software development company. Mr 

Sudhir Rao started his career with Tata Consultancy Services (TCS), Mumbai in the Management 

Consultancy Division. After TCS, Mr Rao joined a pharmaceutical exports company and then moved on to 

work with one of the leading pharmaceutical companies of India. 

India has made giant strides in information 

and communication technology 

(ICT) in the last couple of 

decades. The Government of India 

started moving the country in the 

right direction way back in the 1980s 

when a revolution in telecommunications 

swept the country. 

The Subscribers Telephone Dialing 

and International Subscribers 

Dialing booths (STC/ISD booths) at 

every nook and corner throughout 

the country brought much needed 

access to every individual. Every 

Indian then had access to, and could 

if they wish, talk to anyone else 

across the world. 

With the recent launch of mobile 

telephony, the Indian population 

now has access and can be in touch 

with whomsoever they wish while on 

the move. The growth of mobile connections 

over the past couple of years 

is only an indication of how well the 

technology has been understood and 

absorbed in this country. With one 

of the fastest growth rates in terms of 

new mobile users, India is now truly 

a part of the always connected 

world. 

The technology revolution in the 

1990s followed the telecommunication 

revolution of the 1980s; this second 

revolution had a strong emphasis 

on building the software skills 

among Indias increasingly young 

population. Today, as a result of this 

building of software skills, Indian 

software engineers are working in 

every large corporation across the 

world. Their skills, ability to grasp 

new concepts, and hardworking 

nature are much sought after everywhere. 

Every new technology that is 

launched worldwide is now available 

in India in a matter of days. The 

prime reason this change has taken 

place over the past few years has 

been largely due to the countrys 

urgent need to convince advanced 

countries everywhere to outsource 

their programming and other technological 

requirements to India. 

Today, every leading software and 

hardware company has a representation 

in India often as an Offshore 

Software Development Centre or a 

Training, Research and Development 

Centre. Microsoft and Oracle, among 

others, have opened up large development 

and research centres in India 

that have contributed to almost every 

new product launched by these companies 

within the last few years. 

Besides making a worldwide impact, 

the Indian ICT sector has also been 

absorbing new technologies, albeit 

slowly. Newer, better and more pro- 

28


Figure 1: Ordering and tracking is simplified and mor efficient. 

ductive business processes are being 

introduced by the sector in almost 

every sphere of business. These 

range from the automation of time 

and attendance systems, work-inprocess, 

and production to logistics 

and distribution processes. 

“With one of the fastest 

growth rates in terms of 

new mobile users, India 

is now truly a part of the 

‘always connected’ 

world” 

Automation in these areas has been 

driven primarily by the use of 

Information Technology and communication. 

The huge number of multinational 

companies introducing the latest 

technology and processes in their 

Indian establishments has also driven 

these changes. Whirlpool is a very 

well known name in the international 

white goods manufacturing segment. 

Recently, Whirlpool India 

implemented an automated production 

tracking system. At the start of 

the manufacturing process, a unique 

barcode is generated for each item 

and affixed to it. 

This barcode is used to track the 

product at each level of the manufacturing 

process. When the product is 

finished, it is sent to a warehouse for 

distribution. The front-end software 

is linked to a database server that 

stores comprehensive data about 

each item. When dispatching the 

products, the barcode is scanned, the 

data is validated, and data about the 

dispatch is included in the database 

in real-time. With the help of hand 

held terminals, the products are 

scanned while in storage and the data 

sent to the server to audit the inventory 

in storage in the warehouse. The 

key benefits of this system have been: 

ˆ The reduction of 

cycle times by 

automating the 

entry of data; 

ˆ The ability to track 

production efficiency, 

machine performance 

and problems, 

including the 

mean time between 

breakdowns, and to 

generate and review 

the data whenever 

required; 

ˆ The simplification 

of inventory control and processing 

that barcodes make possible; 

ˆ The continuous availability of a 

complete product history. 

It is not only the multinational companies 

that have introduced the latest 

technologies in their manufacturing 

processes. 

Many Indian companies have also 

realised the benefits of adopting the 

latest technologies for their manufacturing 

and administrative processes. 

Tata Iron and Steel Company 

(TISCO), which is Indias largest private 

sector steel manufacturing company, 

recently upgraded its entire 

production unit. The company’s 

“Every new technology 

that is launched worldwide 

is now available in 

India in a matter of 

days.” 

four-phase modernisation programme 

has enabled it to acquire 

most modern steel making facilities 

in the world. 

The highly productive blast furnaces 

along with LD Converters and down 

stream continuous casting facilities 

gave Tata Steel a distinct edge and 

helped it achieve its vision of becoming 

the world’s lowest cost producer 

of steel. Its coke ovens with stamp 

charging technology have helped it 

make blast furnace grade coke at the 

lowest cost in the world and drastically 

reduce wastage and emission of 

pollutants. 

As it upgraded its manufacturing 

facilities, Tata Steel also introduced 

automation for many of its other supporting 

processes. The most prominent 

amongst these has been the 

introduction of an automated steel 

coil tracking system. The application 

software generates the work orders 

based upon a process requirement 

generated from information contained 

in the master schedule of 

Tatas CRM information system 

(CRM-IS). The work order is then 

transmitted through a high-speed 

fibre optic and a 2.4GHz FHSS wireless 

network to the crane computer 

(VMU 5055) through a local access 

point. 

The crane operator moves the coil 

from its source location to the target 

position using a laser distance meter 

to guide it to its destination. All this 

is done by way of a single start command. 

Ground supervisors carry the 

hand held terminals with barcode 

scanners and scan the barcodes, 

printed automatically using barcode 

printers, found on the stocked coils. 

Reconfirmation, exceptional handling 

and dispatch scheduling are 

also initiated using these hand held 

terminals. 

The key benefits derived by TISCO in 

implementing such a system have 

been: 

ˆ Real time updating of the coil/slab 

status in TISCOs central database 

that can then be made available to 

top management or even to customers; 

ˆ Zero level errors in the placing and 

pickup of coils in the storage yard; 

ˆ 100 per cent assured coil dispatch 

to the right customer; 

ˆ Effective utilisation of material 

handling system and a drastic cut 

down in delays and lost time; 

ˆ 66 per cent manpower reduction in 

the yard level operations; 

ˆ Elimination of Human Errors in 

Yard Operations; 

ˆ According to customer statistics, 

return on investment expected within 

fourteen months from the effective 

start date of system usage. 

Another example where the use of 

“Besides making a 

worldwide impact, the 

Indian ICT sector has 

also been absorbing new 

technologies, albeit 

slowly.” 

29


Figure 2: This barcode is used to track the 

product at each level of the manufacturing 

process. 

digital technology has been deployed 

effectively is Hindustan Lever 

Limiteds (HLL) use of technology to 

resolve its logistics operations. 

Fast moving HLL is India’s largest 

consumer goods company, with leadership 

in home and personal care 

products, foods and beverages and 

specialty chemicals. 

The leading business magazine, 

Forbes Global, has placed Hindustan 

Lever at the top, among the best consumer 

household products companies 

worldwide, for the current year. 

“India has been climbing 

the developmental ladder–maturing, 

absorbing 

and implementing 

new technologies.” 

"Reflecting the compounding buying 

power in emerging markets, the company 

that tops this years A-list of 

household products is neither 

American, nor European, but Indian, 

said Forbes. 

HLL focuses on FMCG—Fast Moving 

Consumer Goods—so there is always a 

demand for their products. Their 

Algida project, for example, tracks 

the order booking and delivery of ice 

cream. Numerous dealers are associated 

with HLL to promote or sell the 

products. The daily processing of 

dealers orders is so tedious that, at 

the end of the day, the person booking 

the order either delivers late or finds 

no stock left in the central warehouse 

to fill the order. 

To break the logjam, a team was allocated 

to book the orders and a separate 

team was allocated carry them 

out - to deliver, invoice and collect the 

payments. To process these operations, 

the field staff uses handheld 

digital devices to book, raise or alter 

the invoice offering discounts, and a 

mobile printer is used to print the 

invoices. 

The companys salesman books the 

orders from different outlets, registers 

any complaints, and inputs other 

product transactions in his handheld 

device. He downloads all this vital 

data to the companys server computer. 

The following day, the salesman 

uploads all the processed order information 

to his handheld terminal and 

executes the order. The program in 

the handheld can process all the 

required validations, handle 

credit/debit adjustments, collection 

details and verify stock, among other 

vital items. 

These vital data are downloaded to the 

server to generate MIS reports. The 

key benefits accrued to the organisation 

included: 

ˆ Facilitated the order booking and 

delivery process; 

ˆ Management can keep track salesman 

productivity and know, for example, 

whether the salesman has visited 

the outlet or not; 

ˆ All transactions are digitally registered; 

ˆ The time spent at each outlet is routinely 

recorded; 

ˆ Invoice mismatches are eliminated. 

Similarly, such breakthrough 

improvements in performance have 

been observed across various industry 

segments throughout the country; all 

achieved due to intelligent use of 

information and communication technology. 

India has been climbing the developmental 

ladder—maturing, absorbing, 

and implementing new technologies. 

Indias drive for technological development 

will, quite likely, provoke a 

new revolution in the region a few 

years from now. 




ICT driven 

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30


India Destination for the World 

by Deepak Jain, General Manager, IT Solutions, Telecom Industry, Wipro Infotech 

India is a world leader in information technology and business process outsourcing (IT 

& BPO) services. The government, recognising the role telecom plays in Indias economic 

development, issued licences to a number of new players to compete and offer 

telecom services. The resulting improvement in Indias telecommunications has been a 

great help to many industries. International FMCG (Fast Moving Consumer Goods) 

companies running centralised applications have shifted their data centres to India—to 

telcos offering data centres and reliable global connectivity. 

Deepak Jain, is the General Manager of IT Solutions for the Telecom Industry at Wipro Infotech. Mr Jain 

has risen through a series of post in his long career at Wipro. Among his many executive posts, he has 

served as Head of Sales for Service and as regional Head for Customer Service. Most recently, Mr Jain 

headed Wipros pioneer effort in the Infrastructure Management Business. 

Deepak graduated from the Delhi College of Engineering with a Bachelors degree in Electronics & 

Communications Engineering. 

India has been one of the worlds foremost 

contributors with respect to 

information technology and business 

process outsourcing—IT & BPO—services. 

For the last few years, India has been, 

and certainly will be for next few 

years, one of the foremost models for 

the telecom community around the 

globe. The primary reason for this has 

been the Indian Governments initiatives 

to realise their goal of opening up 

the countrys telecom sector to private 

investment. 

The government has recognised and 

supported the role telecom infrastructure 

can play in the economic development 

of India. 

Some of the key points on the governments 

agenda have been: 

ˆ To issue licences permitting a number 

of Indias telecom operators to 

compete and offer telecom services. 

This has driven growth - in excess of 

100 per cent—of the wireless market 

and has made telecom services available 

at extremely competitive rates for 

Indias large population; 

ˆ To allow global companies to participate 

in Indias market by providing 

telecom infrastructure and related 

services to telecom service providers; 

ˆ To encourage the introduction of 

new technologies from the technology 

leaders of the world with a minimum 

lag time; 

ˆ To achieve a tele-density of 7 per 

100, 15 months ahead of plan; 

ˆ To reach a tele-density of 15 by 2010 

— currently, this also seems likely to be 

achieved ahead of plan; 

ˆ To build the size of the telecom 

Service industry—now US$ 12.25 billion, 

up from US$ 10.24 billion last 

year; 

ˆ To increase Indias undersea cable 

connectivity to other parts of the 

world—the Singtel / Bharti joint ventures 

i2i cable links India to the 

worlds highest capacity system in 

Singapore. 

The telcos in India include global players 

such as Hutchison, Singtel 

(through its joint venture partner 

Bharti TeleVentures), Indias corporate 

giants such as Reliance 

Infocomm, Tata Group, and the 

incumbent Government operators 

BSNL and MTNL. All these telcos are 

working on a number of initiatives to 

offer a wide variety of telecom services 

to customers. 

The major telecom equipment suppliers, 

such as Ericsson, Motorola, 

Lucent, Nokia, Nortel, Tellabs, Cisco 

and Alcatel, have all bagged major 

contracts to supply parts of the countrys 

telecom infrastructure. 

Qualcomm, with its CDMA technology, 

has been growing rapidly in Indias 

marketplace. More than 75000km of 

fibre has been laid across the length 

and breadth of the country to support 

upgraded telecom services. The telcos 

31

7th 

annual event 

8 – 9 March 2005, Conrad Hotel, Hong Kong 

New Revenue Streams 

Back for the 7th year, Carriers World Asia 2005 is Asia’s leading 

conference in 2005 dedicated to addressing all the strategic issues 

related to the one of the world’s most important telecommunications 

market - Asia. No other event tackles the strategic issues facing 

carriers today with the clarity and integrity of Carriers World. 

Bringing together Asia’s carriers decision makers, this event provides 

an outstanding opportunity for world-class carriers, service providers 

and technology vendors to meet and discuss opportunities and 

challenges facing the “new” Asia carrier industry. It is where you 

will get to meet Asia’s key carriers face-to-face and present your 

solutions to a targeted audience of decision-makers. 

Why you should sponsor or exhibit at Carriers World 

Asia 2005: 

• Generate real sales leads from meeting genuine decision makers 

• Build on your profile and brand awareness by being seen where 

it matters 

• Get cost effective marketing exposure and branding to your 

target audience, culminating in face-to-face meetings with your 

best prospects 

• No other event can offer your organization concentrated exposure 

to an audience of this caliber 

• Position and profile yourself as an industry leader 

• Increase your brand recognition 

• Develop relationships through networking opportunities 

• This is the best investment you will make for 2005! 

And sponsorship works! 

What you want is market visibility and ways to express your 

company’s leadership in the market. You want to be the first one 

they approach if they are looking to explore a business deal or ask 

for a professional opinion at the event. 

We call that being a sponsor. 

We work with you to tailor branding opportunities to meet your 

marketing needs, and to actively target your established and potential 

client base, delivering to you the audience you want to see at the 

event. 

Connect your business directly to a group of targeted customers 

today! 

Endorsed by: 

Organised by: 

CARRIERS WORLD ASIA 2005 FAX (65) 6226 3264 

I am interested in attending the conference. Please contact me. 

I am interested in sponsorship/exhibiting at the event. Please contact me 

Name: ___________________________________________________________________________________ 

Designation: __________________________________________ 

Organisation: ___________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________ 

Address: ________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________ 

________________________________________________ Postcode: _______________________________ Country: _____________________________________________ 

Tel: ____________________________________________ Fax: ____________________________________ E-mail: ________________________________________________ 

For more information please contact Cecilia Lee at Tel: +65 63222 730 or email: cecilia.lee@terrapinn.com 

www.terrapinn.com/2005/cwa_hk


currently offer a wide range of services 

in India including: 

ˆ Wireless connectivity based on GSM 

or CDMA; 

ˆ State of the art technology wireline 

networks; 

ˆ Broadband and Internet connectivity; 

ˆ Value added services such as location 

based services, push to talk, messaging, 

multilingual SMS and host of 

content based applications among 

others; 

ˆ MPLS (multi-protocol label switching) 

and VoIP (voice over Internet 

Protocol). 

Indias improved telecom infrastructure 

has been a great help to various 

industries: 

ˆ BPOs, business process outsourcers, 

provide call centre services and need 

very reliable communications, as 

there is a penalty for every dropped 

call; 

ˆ Offshore software development 

companies such as Wipro, TCS, 

Infosys, Satyam etc, provide software 

services for international clients; connectivity 

is crucial to their business; 

ˆ FMCG (Fast Moving Consumer 

Goods) companies running centralised 

applications have shifted their 

data centres to India—to telcos offering 

data centres and reliable global 

connectivity. 

The worlds leading OSS-BSS 

(Operations and Business Support 

Services) players—CSG, Convergys, 

Portal, Intec, Comptel, Metasolv and 

HP—are developing their latest solutions 

in the billing, mediation, interconnect, 

fraud and revenue assurance, 

service assurance, inventory management, 

and service provisioning etc. in 

India. 

India has many prepaid and post paid 

mobile subscribers. The telcos offer 

them a wide range of plans, innovative 

ideas, new applications and powerful 

devices to meet their needs. Nokia, 

Samsung, LG, Ericsson, and Motorola 

dominate the handset market. 

Indias major market segments have a 

variety of specific needs: 

ˆ Upper class Consumers: High-end, 

feature rich, handsets and data services 

(MMS etc.). In this segment, 

almost every household member over 

12 years of age has a phone; 

ˆ Upper Middle Consumers: These 

need to be connected and want to be 

trendy; 

ˆ Lower Middle class households and 

entrepreneurs: This segment is largely 

prepaid; it includes small entrepreneurs 

who use it for work, e.g. 

Reliance Infocomm offered them call 

rates as low as 1 cent per minute and 

hopes this way to replace other means 

of communication, such as letters, 

with phones; 

ˆ Corporate segment: The segment 

needs to maintain contact with its key 

employees and uses closed-user-group 

services to reduce the costs of voice 

communication with its employees. 

Corporate users are big customers for 

Internet connectivity and data communications 

in general; 

ˆ Small and Medium Enterprises: 

This segment needs reduced cost 

mobile connectivity; it uses shared 

services and virtual private networks 

for data services instead of proprietary 

data networks. 

Overall, though, the most important 

single trend observed seems to be the 

replacement of landline with convenient, 

lower cost, mobile service. 

Mobile users now exceed wireline consumers 

in parts of India. 

In India, Information and 

Communications Technology (ICT) is 

continually creating completely new 

solutions for enterprise customers 

that promise to be major revenue generators 

around the globe. 

Telecom service providers and IT 

services providers are working closely 

to address customer requirements 

that depend upon integrated ICT 

infrastructures. These include such 

critically important applications as 

enterprise data centres that connect 

and integrate a companys offices 

worldwide as well as to its corporate 

disaster recovery centre. 

Solutions are needed that let businesses 

run non-stop, 24x7, with 99.9 per 

cent uptime. This requires IT and 

telco companies to work together to 

ensure client business application 

availability. 

The ICT sector is working to provide a 

new level of support for the corporate 

markets key needs by connecting a 

large, mobile, workforce; and developing 

an e-enabled organisation with 

automated workflow based processes 

for day to day functioning and regular 

feedback from workers in the field. 

IT companies and telcos are joining 

hands to meet these business needs 

for mobile, e-enabled, corporate applications, 

in particular: 

ˆ Email/Messaging—almost all telcos 

in India offer mobile email access; this 

is a very popular application; 

ˆ Office productivity - office applications 

such as MSWord, PowerPoint, 

and Excel are being offered as services; 

ˆ Sales force automation—to enable 

the sales force to regularly upload 

sales information for management 

review; 

ˆ Dealer/retailer outlet connectivity - 

large corporations in the FMCG and 

manufacturing sectors have extended 

value chains. The need to be connected 

with their support infrastructure 

and retailers is critical to their business. 

Mobile enabling of these applications 

has been a growth catalyst in 

these sectors. 

The telecom segment in India has had 

a major impact upon the day-to-day 

life of individuals and the way business 

is conducted by organisations, 

and has helped speed the countrys 

economic development. In years to 

come, India will be a place to watch for 

key innovations and as an example to 

other parts of globe. 

We welcome your 

comments ... 

If you have any 

comments or opinions about 

India, 

a Giant on the March 

we would like 

to hear from you. 

Simply complete the reply 

card and fax it back to our 

editorial team. 

Fax no: 

+44 20 7474 0900 

or send an email to 

editorial@connect-world.com 

33


Bringing Up VAS in Indian Markets 

by Sanjiv Mital, CEO of Bharti Telesoft Intl. Pvt. Ltd 

Wireless telephony has overtaken fixed telephony in India. With 41.6 million wireless subscribers 

and one billion strong population, Indias market potential is enormous, but market 

fragmentation is a challenge. The success of vernacular FM broadcasting shows the 

potential of local language service offerings to boost mass acceptance. Vernacular voice 

services can bring large numbers of Indias text averse and text illiterate subscribers to an 

operators fold. Astrology, Bollywood and cricket—all Indian passions—currently dominate 

VAS services in India. 

Mr Sanjiv Mital is the CEO of Bharti Telesoft Intl. Pvt. Ltd, a market-leading provider of VAS products and 

services to wireline and wireless carriers. Before joining Bharti Telesoft, Mr Sanjiv served as CEO of Bharti 

BT, a joint venture between the Bharti group and British Telecom, providing VSAT services and satellitebased 

corporate communication solutions. Mr Sanjiv previously worked with IBM, Wipro, Unisys and 

ORG Systems, primarily in India, but has wide international experience with IBM in Singapore and Unisys 

in USA. 

Mr Sanjiv graduated from the Indian Institute of Technology in Kanpur where he completed his Bachelors 

degree in Electronics Engineering. Mr Sanjiv earned his MBA from the Indian Institute of Management in 

Calcutta. 

Widely recognised as one of the 

worlds hottest growth wireless frontiers, 

India is the world’s 13th largest 

market and, according to EMC, its size 

should quadruple—to be counted 

among the top five markets with 

China, Brazil, USA and Russia—in the 

next five years. 

Indias prodigious pace of wireless 

growth is evident from the 1.3 million 

new subscriber additions a month. 

In the last three years, two out of every 

three new subscribers were wireless 

subscribers. Consequentially, wireless 

telephony growth has overtaken fixed 

telephony in India; it now accounts for 

40 per cent of Indias total subscriber 

base as compared to 9.5 per cent in 

2000. With 41.6 million wireless subscribers 

among its one billion strong 

population, Indias market potential is 

enormous. Provisional forecasts by 

research firm Gartner suggest an 

unstoppable momentum as cellular 

connections reach 130 million by 

2008. 

A dissection of these apparently 

impressive growth figures reveals a 

bed of hidden complexities largely 

stemming from the unique dynamics 

of the Indian market. Although India 

has embraced mobile phones with an 

enthusiasm few regions can match, 

the voracious month-to-month 

growth in subscriber aggregation is 

fuelled by aggressive price cuts by 

major carriers. 

In fact, given the intense competition, 

average mobile tariffs in urban areas 

have fallen to one US cent per minute, 

making India the cheapest place in the 

world to be a mobile phone user. With 

voice constituting 95 per cent of operator 

revenues, the flip side is cellular 

operators’ Average Revenue Per User 

has plummeted by 64 per cent over 

the last five years to $11 in 2004 and is 

likely to decline by 13 per cent annually 

to touch $7.39 by 2008. 

As voice revenues bottom out, the 

future scale and growth of businesses 

is now dependent on tapping the 

under-penetrated potential of value 

added services—VAS. Most operators 

are network ready and have invested 

heavily in sophisticated Messaging 

Platforms, 2.5 G, GPRS, and EDGE 

networks to prepare for future 3G 

services. Still, VAS now contributes a 

mere 5 per cent of operator revenues 

and is restricted to small segment of 

the urban subscriber base. 

Actualising VAS potential in a market 

dominated by low-income subscribers, 

where communication seems 

to exhaust itself in the practical function 

of contact, is the greatest challenge 

today and is dependent on identifying 

realistic innovative opportuni- 

34


ties and marketing it right to make the 

un-tethered world of ubiquitous wireless 

access a reality. 

Atomised markets and smart 

customisation 

The US and European markets are relatively 

uniform; India is many markets 

with wide-ranging diversities in 

culture, income and literacy levels. 

The New India is also a highly competitive 

market with tremendous revenue 

potential. 

The multi-market fragmentation presents 

a marketing challenge. Although 

most networks recognise Indian markets 

inherent cultural and economic 

fragmentation, VAS is largely directed 

at the urban market and is shockingly 

similar across networks notwithstanding 

regional variations in the uptake of 

data services. 

A one-size fits all standardised 

approach, transferred wholesale to 

different regions, results in flagship 

presence only. Operators must identify 

each regions unique wireless market 

opportunities and have a healthy 

mix of products to target the severe 

heterogeneity that marks Indian markets. 

Future at the Bottom of the 

Pyramid 

Indias rural mobile market is less 

than 15 per cent of the total according 

to the Cellular Operator Association of 

India (CAOI). As prime urban markets 

reach saturation, operators must 

shift focus to tap under-penetrated 

segments. This will require radical 

innovations in technology and business 

models for operators to initially 

target service accessibility rather than 

subscriber volumes. 

Two recent cases illustrate the point. 

Bharti Televentures, Indias largest 

GSM provider, announced plans to set 

up SMS kiosks in Southern India to 

improve revenues from person to person 

messaging. Machine usage is similar 

to that of a coin operated PCO 

(public call office) telephone. Users 

can send local SMS and receive 

responses for as low as one cent. In 

addition, subscribers can store messages 

in the inbox, subject to a maximum 

of 25 at any given time. 

Similarly, Shyam Telecom (recently 

bought by Bharti Televentures), in 

Indias Northern State of Rajasthan, 

opted to take its service to subscribers 

rather than wait for them to trickle in. 

The company equipped a fleet of rickshaws 

with mobile phones, billing 

machines and printers. 

Drivers pedal these mobile payphones 

through the state capital, Jaipur, and 

surrounding districts and encourage 

people to use the voice and text services. 

In a communication deficient country, 

where only four out of 100 people have 

phones and wireless handsets are considered 

an expensive luxury, community 

kiosks free operators from crippling 

dependence on handset adoption, 

or, highly subsidising handsets 

and lays the foundation for future 

streaming VAS. 

Go local 

Indian operators can learn from successful 

vernacular FM broadcast experience 

in India. Launched in English 

in Bangalore, FM 91s audience doubled 

when it began vernacular broadcasts. 

The English-speaking subscriber segment 

is a minority in India. 

Packaging, promoting and selling vernacular 

programming, addressing 

local concerns, can lure large majorities 

of non-English segment to the 

network. 

Mobile operators in India, historically, 

have had little involvement in handset 

design and configuration. To mass 

market VAS services, operators need 

to work with manufacturers to tailor 

handsets with Unicode support for 

Indian languages to bring in higher 

revenues and profits 

Voice-based VAS 

India is primarily a voice market. 

Strong marketing to capitalise on 

mass acceptance of voice services can 

yield instant dividends by bringing 

large numbers of Indias text averse 

and text illiterate subscribers to an 

operators fold. 

Approximately 13,000 subscribers 

called Airtels Live service to listen to 

election results in May 2004 (per 

Business World). Infotainment services 

such as voice-chat have enormous 

growth potential in urban and nonurban 

areas. 

Concierge services, such as bill 

enquiry, account balance, dial a cab, 

call an ambulance, home tips, local 

events, city guides over voice can be a 

huge draw. 

Look beyond ABC of data VAS 

Astrology, Bollywood, and 

cricket—Indian passions—dominate 

VAS services in India. Undoubtedly, 

infotainment services are extremely 

popular but operators need to invest 

equally in other value-based services. 

Specific content such as mandi (market) 

prices, weather updates, business 

and financial advisories for small 

business, medical education, career 

counselling over SMS, and updates on 

government schemes can increment 

the subscriber base in semi-urban and 

rural areas. 

Ubiquitous distribution 

Given Indias enormous size, lack of 

retail outlets, and large numbers of 

prepaid subscribers, distribution is 

the most challenging problems for 

businesses in emerging markets. To 

accelerate volume build-up, operators 

need to invest in costly sales and distribution 

systems, with no immediate 

revenue assurance. 

To build a broad distribution base, 

operators need to look at creative 

alternative channels. For example, 

several Indian networks have 

deployed electronic recharge solutions 

where subscribers can top up accounts 

over SMS. These alternate distribution 

channels operate for as little as 

half the cost of traditional wholesale 

and retail channels, help operators 

pass on savings to subscribers and 

develop pervasive branding. 

Indian cellular data service revenues 

will grow to 148 billion rupees by 

2008, according to Gartner, accounting 

for 21 per cent of total revenue 

compared with just over five per cent 

in 2003. To realise this, operators 

must deploy out-of-the-box solutions. 

The markets are ripe for exploitation; 

most VAS solution providers, such as 

Telesoft, are preparing for the VAS 

future. Now, VAS marketing departments 

need only look beyond!


Communications and commerce in digital India 

by Ramesh Krishnan, Director of Operations, VeriSign Communications Services, India 

Today, the urban Indian is a mobile carrying, e-mail savvy consumer who is reaping the 

benefits of a global digital revolution. Indias 300 million strong relatively affluent middleclass 

has huge buying power. Income levels are up significantly, with Indias emergence as 

the worlds back-office and software development super-power. Indias people, educators, 

private sector, multinational corporations and government, needs to work together and 

harness the countrys energy and transform the worlds largest democracy into the largest 

digital economy on the planet. 

Mr Ramesh Krishnan is the Director of Operations for VeriSign Communications Services in India. Before 

joining VeriSign, Mr Krishnan held senior positions at Lucent Technologies, Quintus Corporation where he 

led the Siebel business unit, and Avaya Communication. Mr Krishnan actively participates in various 

industry events, and has spoken and chaired sessions at conferences such as NASSCOM, CTI, and 

Supercomm. Mr Krishnan received his Masters degree in Economics and Business from the University of 

Delaware (Newark/DE, USA), and is an alumnus of Wharton Econometrics (Philadelphia, USA). 

There is no denying that communications 

has been the single largest 

contributor to a shrinking globe, 

and continues to shatter boundaries 

that were previously considered 

unassailable. The digital 

divide that was once a yawning gap 

between the developed and the notso-developed 

economies is slowly 

but surely closing. 

Paying your utility bills, topping up 

your mobile phone or making 

reservations for your vacation, need 

but a few clicks on your slick handheld 

using a simple service called 

SMS. Whether its movie tickets, or 

dating services, hailing a cab or 

ordering pizza, everything is but a 

SMS message away. 

Sitting in a train during rush hour 

is easier when you tune to a melody 

coming from a mobile phone—one 

that even allows you to capture a 

photo. You no longer have to 

appreciate your photography skills 

alone; you can share your photos 

with friends and family or post 

them on your website, directly from 

your wireless device. 

If you think this is San Francisco or 

New York or London, or the latest 

Mission Impossible, guess again; 

it is in todays India, a country with 

a young, growing, educated, middle-class 

that is larger than the population 

of the United States. 

Education, access, affordability, 

and adoption are the keys to a societys 

ability to absorb innovation 

and reap the benefits of technology. 

Had it not been for the private sector, 

specifically companies like 

Bharti, Infosys, Satyam, TATA and 

Wipro, this digital life in India 

would still be out of grasp for the 

millions who are currently experiencing 

the transformation. 

The community as a whole 

embraced this new digital lifestyle; 

its insatiable desire to keep up with 

the times is a catalyst that speeds 

up the adoption of new technologies. 

In digital India, if you are the 

only one in your group without 

these digital implements you will be 

left behind. 

After many years in the US, I had a 

pleasant awakening a few years ago 

on my first return to India. I was 

not prepared for the bustling IT 

parks, glassy buildings, manicured 

campuses, locally manufactured 

autos, coffee shops at every major 

locus, pizzerias, and the list goes 

on. One could call it a reverse culture 

shock of sorts. 

36


Walk into an offshore development 

centre, or a business 

process outsourcing campus, 

and one would think one was 

in an office park somewhere 

in the USA. Indias well-educated 

labour pool—swelling 

by few million every year as 

new graduates join the workforce—has 

attracted the 

largest Fortune 500 multinational 

companies to maintain 

a presence in India. 

Adoption of new technologies 

and living in a wireless 

world comes quite naturally 

in such an environment. 

Until about six years ago, 

owning a telephone, let alone 

the latest wireless gizmo, was 

a luxury in this land of a billion 

people. There were a 

few cyber cafes and e-mail 

was just beginning to make its presence 

felt. 

Today, the urban Indian is a mobile 

carrying, e-mail savvy consumer 

who is reaping the benefits of a 

global digital revolution. 

There are now 40 million mobile 

subscribers and the number continues 

to grow at an aggressive pace. 

Although wire-line still provides 

most telephone access, ahead by 

about 8-9 million over wireless, 

that may be history by the time we 

roll our calendars to 2005. 

Much of this development and 

growth has been due to the liberalisation 

policies of governments over 

the past 8-10 years, especially since 

1998, that have enabled this transformation 

in a largely agrarian 

economy. 

Less known, is the fact that 50 million 

households have cable 

access—and these are the official 

numbers. This is a significant contributor 

to modern India, and has 

been a huge catalyst in the digital 

revolution. 

To their credit, content providers 

have been very innovative in 

spreading this message and fanning 

the flames of digital living. 

Technology for technologys sake 

will never find mass appeal unless 

it can address the needs of the consumer. 

What good is it if you can buy the 

latest mobile phone, but no access 

Figure 1: India has attracted the largest fortune 500 multinational 

companies to their shores. 

to the network 

There was a time when a phone was 

a luxury even for the middle class, 

not because of the cost, but due to 

the lack of available lines, the 

bureaucracy and an inefficient system. 

“Whether its movie tickets 

or dating services, 

hailing a cab or ordering 

pizza, everything is but 

an SMS message away.” 

In present day India, you may have 

a hard time finding a post and telegraph 

office, the old bastion of 

communication, but mobile SIM 

cards and top-up cards of your 

choice are available in plenty at any 

“Today, the urban Indian 

is a mobile carrying, e- 

mail savvy consumer 

who is reaping the benefits 

of a global digital 

revolution. There are 

now 40 million mobile 

subscribers and the 

number continues to 

grow at an aggressive 

pace.” 

roadside shack. 

It is this kind of easy access that 

enables contacting your plumber, 

or milkman or carpenter to make 

your daily life easier. Then 

too, it is no longer a matter of 

pride, but a necessity to have a 

mobile or an email address in 

India today. In fact, the transformation 

has gone to such an 

extent that not having an 

email or a mobile phone these 

days is detrimental to ones 

success. 

Being digital is not only a state 

of mind, it is reflected in our 

behaviour, our habits, and the 

way we go about every day 

lives. A good example of this is 

the Indian Railways, one of the 

largest networks worldwide. It 

is still the cheapest and most 

accessible way for anyone to 

travel within the country. 

Gone are the days when you 

need to physically go to a railway 

reservation booth at the station 

to make or even find out schedules. 

While it may not be the friendliest 

of websites, the Indian Railways 

has definitely made it very easy for 

someone with computer access to 

buy tickets online—and it works like 

a charm. 

For the savvier e-Commerce buff, 

India boasts its own version of eBay 

where you can buy and sell almost 

anything. The same is true for buying 

books online, ordering dinner, 

renting DVDs, buying clothes, etc. 

The growth in popularity of online 

matrimonial bureaus is most 

impressive in a culture that has the 

deep-seated custom of arranged 

marriages. 

Websites that act as introductory 

forums are very popular, so much 

so that the leading newspapers, and 

their Sunday classifieds, have 

jumped into the online fray in order 

to preserve their evaporating clientele. 

A significant portion of the population, 

though, is still quite sheltered 

from the on-going digital revolution. 

Education in rural areas is still 

wanting, there are not enough 

schools, none in some areas, and 

basic needs in such places are a luxury. 

Seventy per cent of India is still 

rural and dependent upon agriculture, 

a sector that has yet to experience 

benefits of modern technolo- 

37


“Being digital is not only 

a state of mind, it is 

reflected in our behaviour, 

our habits and the 

way we go about every 

day lives.” 

gy. Electricity and running water 

are still wanting in many rural 

areas. This might be attributed to 

the government, but the private 

sector is equally to blame as there is 

a dearth of corporate social responsibility 

in India. 

Technology providers have a captive 

audience in urban areas, more 

than they can handle, so they focus 

much of their effort there. 

India is a complex society with a 

very diverse population. The only 

way to spread and share the benefits 

of technology is to take a collaborative 

approach between the government 

and private sector. 

Look at Japan with its un-stable 

political machinery; there the common 

man, the farmer, the young 

girl in a rural area, everyone enjoys 

the benefits of development. 

Granted they do not have a billion 

mouths to feed, but they do have 

discipline, above and beyond politics, 

ingrained in the system. 

Discipline and collaboration can 

overcome Indias difficulties and 

bring technology to people in rural 

areas so they can enjoy the same 

experience as those in urban areas. 

It is only a matter of good management 

and right coaching. 

So, where do we go from here The 

new way, the new age of communications 

and commerce has not only 

arrived, it is also well, growing and 

will continue to shatter any roadblock 

that comes in its path. This is 

because mankind wants more; it 

has a thirst to live—to live well. It is 

a lot like learning to fly or ride a 

bicycle, once you succeed there is 

no looking back. 

Sentiments aside, there are numbers 

to prove the point. Indias 

middle-class is 300 million strong 

with a huge ability to spend. This 

generation is not like its predecessors 

who believed in saving for a 

rainy day, not in enjoying life while 

they were young. Income levels 

have jumped up significantly, with 

Indias emergence as the worlds 

back-office and a super-power in 

“India is a complex society 

with a very diverse 

population. The only 

way to spread and share 

the benefits of technology 

is to take a collaborative 

approach between 

the government and private 

sector.” 

software development. 

The under 30 age group makes up 

55 per cent of Indias population, 

and within five years, they will add 

up to almost 60 per cent. Given 

demographic dynamics of that 

nature, the demand for newer and 

better ways of life can only increase. 

Reputed institutions such as 

McKinsey and the World Bank have 

predicted that India, China, and 

Brazil, will be the top three 

economies by 2025. 

All the basic ingredients are there. 

It is up to the people, the educators, 

the private sector, the multinational 

corporations, the Indian 

government, and the political 

machinery to combine and harness 

this energy and transform 

the worlds largest democracy 

to the largest digital economy 

on the planet. 




ICT driven 

development 

on line. 

Here you can 

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Highlights, 






world. 

Visit 


at 


Figure 2: Everything is a SMS message away. 

38

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Connectivity 

Digital IndiaThe underwater connection 

by Peter Ford, CEO, Global Marine Systems Limited 

Indias success providing outsourced services worldwide has shown that, with education 

and commitment, developing nations can conquer international markets. The growth of 

international connectivity is crucial to continue Indias international commercial success. 

Satellites and submarine cables can carry the traffic, but cables, historically, have been too 

expensive and satellites do not have sufficient capacity. New technology, though, has 

reduced the cost of submarine systems and developing countries can now afford regional 

systems to compete against the developed countries in global markets. 

Peter Ford is the CEO of Global Marine Systems Limited, a provider of submarine fibre optic cable installation 

and maintenance services. Mr Ford is an experienced business manager having been Managing 

Director or CEO of numerous companies in many sectors for over 15 years. His background is telecommunications 

begun with BT during privatisation in the 1980s. Mr Ford later worked within the sector with a 

number of private organisations. Mr Ford is the chairman of a specialist data centre fit-out company 

Waterfields, which has built over 500,000sq ft of space occupied by the world’s leading telcos. 

National success on a regional 

scale 

The success of India in developing and 

providing outsourced customer service 

facilities to major corporations 

outside its borders has been nothing 

short of remarkable. Indias ability to 

provide highly educated, technically 

aware representatives to a broad 

range of companies has shown that 

with the right education and a national 

and regional commitment to development, 

developing nations can enter 

the international market place in 

areas where little previous experience. 

Measuring Indias success in outsourced 

services, the numbers speak 

for themselves. By 2008, an estimated 

US$70-80 billion in software and 

services earnings will contribute 30 

per cent of all foreign exchange 

inflows, an increase from 8 per cent in 

2002. 

By 2008, this sector alone will provide 

two million service jobs and an additional 

two million jobs in the parallel 

support services sectors. 

The growth opportunities for this 

service sector are as impressive as its 

performance to date. Considering the 

abilities of Indias established service 

industry, several future challenges can 

be seen: 

ˆ Tap new service lines 

As off shoring gains acceptance in 

mainstream IT markets, Indian IT 

companies will penetrate new service 

lines such as packaged software support 

and installation; IT consulting; 

network infrastructure management; 

systems integration; IS outsourcing; 

IT training and education; hardware 

support and installation; and network 

consulting. 

ˆ Focus on under penetrated geographies 

Established markets have been 

tapped, but large non-English speaking 

markets in Japan and Western 

Europe, with a $5-6 billion export 

potential, have not been reached. 

Also, English-speaking regions such 

as Canada, Netherlands, Sweden and 

Australia, account for 6.7 per cent of 

the world’s IT spending and represent 

an opportunity of US$ 1.2 billion by 

2008. 

ˆ Target high potential verticals 

Three key verticals (financial services, 

telecom and manufacturing) account 

for nearly 45 per cent of todays revenues. 

Indian companies need to target 

verticals like retail, telecom service 

providers and healthcare for their next 

wave of growth. 

ˆ Tapping Product Centric Opportunities 

India has established strong credentials 

in the IT services, but has only the 

0.2 per cent of the US$ 180 billion 

software products market. 

40

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