In the seas off the Cochin coast of southern India, the steady drone of motorized fishing boats is often interrupted by the ringing of mobile phones. Even as they land their catch in the boats, fishermen are already in touch with the dozen-odd seafood markets around here, checking prices at different ports.
One fisherman, Ratish Karthikeyan, says that since acquired his BPL mobile service more than a year ago, his profit on each eight-day fishing run in his trawler has doubled. Two months ago, for instance, Karthikeyan, 35, netted an extra US$1,000 by using his phone to compare prices at Cochin with those at Quilon, a port 85 miles away.
The 5,000 fishermen who work off the coast of Kerala state are not alone in embracing wireless technology. From garment exporters in Tiruppur in the south to farmers in Punjab in the north, rural India has discovered the convenience of doing business on mobile phones. Many areas have never had conventional fixed-line service.
"There is so much happening in small towns and rural areas in India, both in terms of economic activity and cultural change, and that is creating a need for mobility and communication like never before," said Fausto B. Cardoso, chief executive of BPL Mobile Cellular Ltd. In some parts of the Indian countryside have more mobile phones for every 100 people than do some of India's biggest cities.
Sensing opportunity, two dozen companies, including multinational corporations like AT&T and Hutchison Telecom, state-owned companies like Mahanagar Telephone Nigam Ltd, and local operators such as Spice Telecom, are jumping into local markets. Some of these companies are already established in Mumbai, New Delhi and other big cities, but they are betting that there is money to be made by serving eager customers in the countryside, too.
For many people in rural areas, there is no alternative. Half of India's 660,000 villages were never wired for fixed-line service, and those places that were connected have outdated equipment and long waiting lists for new service.
"Rural telephony has been terribly neglected in India, and the demand has been artificially capped by long waiting lists," said Kobita Desai, a mobile-phone industry analyst for the Gartner Group, a research and advisory firm.
Phone companies are embracing some novel approaches to fill the gap. In the Bhimavaram region in the southeast, for example, Birla Tata AT&T -- jointly owned by AT&T and two Indian industrial conglomerates, the Birla Group and the Tata Group -- has successfully targeted shrimp farmers. "Our expanded coverage has led to the segment wholeheartedly embracing mobile phones," said S. Nagarajan, the general manager for marketing.
Even in territories like the western Maharashtra and Gujarat, populated by an affluent mix of people in industry and farming, as well as Madhya Pradesh, a less-developed region, the awareness of the benefits of cellular phones has increased tremendously, Nagarajan said.
The Gartner Group forecasts that the growth rate of mobile-phone subscribers in India will be the highest in Asia, reaching 30 million by 2005 from a mere 3.1 million at the end of 2000. By then, if the projections prove accurate, India will have moved well past the much smaller Philippines in the total number of mobile users but will still remain far behind China.
To woo customers, companies are slashing prices and advertising heavily. Birla Tata AT&T cut fees by 25 percent to 50 percent, varying prices by region. A competitor, Fascel Ltd, of which Hutchison Telecom of Hong Kong owns 49 percent, also halved its tariffs, then promoted its cheap prices in television commercials featuring farmers speaking in local dialects on their mobile phones.
Potential customers, including spice traders in Unjha and sugar cane farmers in Bardoli, responded. "As farmers and small-business men realize the impact of mobile communications on the pace and efficiency of their lives, usage is shooting up rapidly," said Sandip Das, the chief executive of Fascel.
In New Delhi, Hutchison Essar, a partnership that includes Hutchison Telecom and the Essar Group of India, is trying to draw lower-income customers with a campaign that compares the cost of a mobile-phone call with that of a summer thirst quencher, nimbu paani, or fresh lime water. "Nimbu Paani -- 3 rupees, Airtime -- 1.78 rupees," say billboards plastered all over the city. In Bombay, the company's billboards feature vada pav, a spicy bread that is a staple of the city's lower middle class. When the company introduced its mobile service in 1994, it charged 16.80 rupees, about US$0.35, a minute. Back then, a mobile phone was a lifestyle accessory in big Indian cities, where only the rich and the near-rich could afford the luxury of having one. India still has relatively few users for its population, which recently exceeded 1 billion. Only about 0.35 percent of Indians subscribe to a mobile-phone service, compared with about 9 percent in China.
But India is poised to catch up, and quickly, say analysts at DSP Merrill Lynch, an investment banking and securities firm. "The value of timely access to market information is clearly dawning across business communities," said Jyoti Jaipuria, the head of research.
Analysts are setting ambitious growth targets for companies, and the operators are pulling out all the stops to achieve those numbers. They have, for example, introduced prepaid services, which they say is crucial to getting more subscribers and widening the geographic coverage.
Birla Tata AT&T sells prepaid packages through several thousand retail outlets in each of the four territories where it has licenses, helping ease entry into cellular use in smaller markets where income levels are lower and people are reluctant to obligate themselves to a flat fee each month.
Wireless companies acknowledge that selling service to rural customers is not yet profitable, but they are focused for now on expanding their markets and signing up customers. In the meantime, they are trying to cover their losses by offering extra services at additional fees. In Punjab, for example, Spice Telecom provides daily updates on bulk rates of agricultural commodities and places to buy and sell produce in major or wholesale markets. It is developing a service with tractor manufacturers to provide servicing and repairs for subscribers.
That may not be enough for some companies as the government increases competition by auctioning off new licenses to private operators, allowing state-run companies to enter the field and approving different technologies.
For these reasons, analysts expect wireless companies to accelerate a recent trend of forging allegiances and merging. In June, for example, BPL and Birla Tata AT&T said they planned to merge to create the country's largest cellular company, valued by the partners at more than US$$2 billion.
The goal, here as elsewhere, is to persuade more people to subscribe and to get subscribers to talk more. Analysts think it will work.
"The industry has achieved a sustainable level of maturity and is likely to maintain its high growth prospects," said Desai, the Gartner Group analyst.
Many average Indians agree.
"Life without a mobile phone," said Karthikeyan, the Cochin fisherman, "is unthinkable."
ROLLER-COASTER RIDE: More than five earthquakes ranging from magnitude 4.4 to 5.5 on the Richter scale shook eastern Taiwan in rapid succession yesterday afternoon Back-to-back weather fronts are forecast to hit Taiwan this week, resulting in rain across the nation in the coming days, the Central Weather Administration said yesterday, as it also warned residents in mountainous regions to be wary of landslides and rockfalls. As the first front approached, sporadic rainfall began in central and northern parts of Taiwan yesterday, the agency said, adding that rain is forecast to intensify in those regions today, while brief showers would also affect other parts of the nation. A second weather system is forecast to arrive on Thursday, bringing additional rain to the whole nation until Sunday, it
LANDSLIDES POSSIBLE: The agency advised the public to avoid visiting mountainous regions due to more expected aftershocks and rainfall from a series of weather fronts A series of earthquakes over the past few days were likely aftershocks of the April 3 earthquake in Hualien County, with further aftershocks to be expected for up to a year, the Central Weather Administration (CWA) said yesterday. Based on the nation’s experience after the quake on Sept. 21, 1999, more aftershocks are possible over the next six months to a year, the agency said. A total of 103 earthquakes of magnitude 4 on the local magnitude scale or higher hit Hualien County from 5:08pm on Monday to 10:27am yesterday, with 27 of them exceeding magnitude 5. They included two, of magnitude
CONDITIONAL: The PRC imposes secret requirements that the funding it provides cannot be spent in states with diplomatic relations with Taiwan, Emma Reilly said China has been bribing UN officials to obtain “special benefits” and to block funding from countries that have diplomatic ties with Taiwan, a former UN employee told the British House of Commons on Tuesday. At a House of Commons Foreign Affairs Committee hearing into “international relations within the multilateral system,” former Office of the UN High Commissioner for Human Rights (OHCHR) employee Emma Reilly said in a written statement that “Beijing paid bribes to the two successive Presidents of the [UN] General Assembly” during the two-year negotiation of the Sustainable Development Goals. Another way China exercises influence within the UN Secretariat is
Taiwan’s first drag queen to compete on the internationally acclaimed RuPaul’s Drag Race, Nymphia Wind (妮妃雅), was on Friday crowned the “Next Drag Superstar.” Dressed in a sparkling banana dress, Nymphia Wind swept onto the stage for the final, and stole the show. “Taiwan this is for you,” she said right after show host RuPaul announced her as the winner. “To those who feel like they don’t belong, just remember to live fearlessly and to live their truth,” she said on stage. One of the frontrunners for the past 15 episodes, the 28-year-old breezed through to the final after weeks of showcasing her unique