Geodesic and Zee Entertainment have entered a strategic alliance to form a new company that will offer entertainment applications for mobile and internet enabled devices.
Headquartered in Mumbai, the new entity called ITM Digital Pvt Ltd will initially provide internet TV on mobile and desktop platforms. The application will stream over 20 live television channels and several on-demand video channels.
A company statement said that consumers across all telecom networks will be able to download the applications, and discover, access, and schedule content through a web interface using broadband, GPRS, EDGE, or Wi-Fi on their mobile phones and desktops.
Punit Goenka, managing director and chief executive officer, Zee Entertainment, “This alliance will enable us to deliver optimised levels of internet integration across our range of assets and product categories. With this venture, we aim to capture the unexplored power of this medium that the Indian audience is fast adapting to.”
The two companies are also exploring opportunities in extending the alliance to combine Zee’s other entertainment assets and Geodesic’s extended mobile products portfolio, the statement added.
Geodesic, Zee form JV for entertainment apps
Nuance to launch Dragon Naturally Speaking app in India
Nuance will soon launch its Dragon Naturally Speaking speech recognition application in India, which will initially support the Hindi and English languages.
Nitin More, account director, Nuance, said, “We are ready with a new speech recognition application for Indian market and will be launching soon. Initially, it will support Hindi and English language.”
This application will help in creating emails, documents and spreadsheets – all by voice. Through this speech recognition application one can capture ones thoughts by speaking in to the mobile handset, which will then convert the speech to text. As per the user’s requirement, voice can be converted to SMS, email or any other text document.
More added that this application will not face any problem in converting voices with different styles to text as Nuance has done a lot of testing regarding that.
Tata Docomo introduces Live Chat
Tata Docomo today announced the launch of its latest customer care initiative Live Chat.
The service will address post paid and pre paid queries of the customer, providing real time solutions. The option to chat live will be available 24×7.
In addition, TATA Docomo will also provide feedback forms that customers can use to give inputs.
Earlier, Reliance Communications had announced a similar service for both its CDMA and GSM services across India. The service offered a chat-based online platform to offer real time handling of consumer issues and queries.
Affle launches Pinch smartphone messaging app
Affle has announced the launch of its Messaging application for smartphones Pinch, in India as well as globally. Plans of the application launch were first reported by Telecom Yatra.
Pinch is meant to combine messenger and location based services. Smartphone users will be able to interact with friends using animations, pictures, emoticons and push notifications. Pinch will also enable users to send data messages across platforms without incurring any SMS/MMS charges. Further, the app supports animations across platforms, and offers over 475 emoticons.
Pinch also offers contact and group management services by helping people discover friends through contacts on their phone, Facebook, Twitter, BlackBerry, Android and email. It allows selective sharing of location and enables users to locate and chat with friends nearby.
The application works on various platforms including iPhone 2G, 3G, 3GS, iPhone 4G (iOS4), iPod Touch, Android 2.x, BlackBerry 4.x and Symbian, and will be available for approximately Rs 45.
Pinch integrates social leaderboard contests within the core messaging platform and rewards people based on over 30 different fun actions. For the current promotion, Affle has announced one free iPad every month and 25 iTunes gift cards every week for the next one year to winners of the Pinch leaderboard contests.
Lemon Mobiles partners with mig33 for social networking
The mobile brand promoted by Fastrack Communications called Lemon Mobiles, and mig33, a global provider of social networking services, today announced a partnership under which a mig33 application will come installed on all Lemon handsets that support internet.
mig33 is a global mobile community that provides chat and social entertainment services to more than 40 million registered members worldwide. It is present in 200 countries, allowing users to chat, share photos and virtual gifts, play games, post messages on each other’s profiles, join groups, create avatars etc.
mig33 is optimised for more than 2,000 mobile devices including low end phones.
India is one of mig33’s fastest growing markets, mentioned the press release. Mohit Gundecha, director of business development, mig33, said in a company statement, “India has enormous growth potential and we’re excited to be working with our new partner Lemon Mobiles. This partnership will help us grow our mobile community in India.”
Windows Phone 7 based mobiles by December
Microsoft announced that it will introduce Windows Phone 7 based mobiles in the market by December this year. Aaron Woodman, director, Microsoft, who is in charge of consumer experiences with Windows Phone, wrote in his blog, “We remain on track for that goal but also believe that launching Windows Phone 7 really is just one more big step along a new path”
He termed this launch as a fresh start for Microsoft’s mobile efforts. He also said that Microsoft will be taking more accountability for the hardware and application development platform.
Windows Phone 7 will be launched across the world at the same time. It will initially support five languages: English, French, Italian, German and Spanish.
The Windows Phone Marketplace will support the sale and purchase of applications in 17 countries: Australia, Austria, Belgium, Canada, France, Germany, Hong Kong, India, Ireland, Italy, Mexico, New Zealand, Singapore, Spain, Switzerland, UK and the United States of America.
Loop Mobile targets high-end prepaid customers with all in one plan
Loop Mobile has launched a new plan called Smart Paid. Smart Paid allows new as well as existing prepaid subscribers to get bundled local and STD minutes under various rental plans.
Surya Mahadevan, chief operating officer, Loop Mobile, said that the offers double the value the customer gets from the typical prepaid product on a monthly commitment of Rs 320 plus.
A new subscription with Smart Paid costs Rs 349, and comes bundled with minutes. Recharge options start from Rs 320. In this, the subscriber gets 1,300 SMSs, 700 minutes of local calls within the network, 500 minutes of local calls with other networks, and 100 minutes of STD calls free. Users also get 2GB internet data usage, missed call alerts and free voice mail. SmartPaid comes in four value options.
Loop mobile is aggressively targeting high value customers. It had earlier launched a Rs 1,000 plus plan called epaid.
Mahadevan added, “Prepaid market is one dimensional with same value proposition across different levels of usage. The insight we had was that subscribers are getting confused about various offers on top-ups and special tariff vouchers in the market. Smart Paid is a simple answer to that confusion as it bundles voice, SMS, VAS and data to present a complete product.”
S Tel enters Assam, focuses on regional VAS
S Tel, a joint venture between Siva Group and Bahrain Telecommunications Company (Batelco), announced the launch of its GSM service in Assam, starting with 26 towns of the state.
The company will shortly launch its service in the remaining cities of Assam and other North East states including Meghalaya, Tripura, Nagaland, Mizoram, Manipur and Arunachal Pradesh.
S Tel is offering two tariff packages in the state: Starter Pack at Rs 49 with 30 days validity, and a limited period launch offer with full Talk time on all top-ups.
Shamik Das, chief executive officer, S Tel, said, “Our strategy is aimed at making benefits of mobility accessible first to under-penetrated markets of Assam and then gradually expanding to bigger towns, thus aiming to bridge the stratum divide as we roll out our services in phases across the region. By the end of this year, we plan to expand our reach across 90 major towns of Assam. We aim to provide a congestion free network with excellent voice quality to consumers in our markets of operation.”
Soumen Ghosh, chief operating officer, Assam and North East circle, S Tel, said, “Today onwards, S Tel products and services can be availed across 2,300 plus retail points present in 26 key towns. Within six months, we aim to double the size of our retailer universe i.e., above 4,500 point of sales, thus ensuring easy access to products anywhere across our markets of operation.”
S Tel offers caller tunes from a database of more than 1,000 songs in Assamese, featuring singers such as Bhupen Hazarika, Zubeen Garg, Udit Narayan, Dikshu and Barnali, to its customers in the state. Voice services in Assamese include regional songs, career advice, travel and tourism related information, local recipes and devotional content from Maa Kamakhya temple. The company also plans to launch a regional voice portal soon and will shortly extend mobile commerce solutions to its customers.
Opera Mini 5.1 now on Android
Opera Software released Opera Mini 5.1 for devices built on the Android platform. It is available for download from the Android Market.
In March, Opera Software had launched a beta version of its mobile web Browser Opera Mini 5 for the Android mobile operating system. While the Opera Mini 5 Beta had features such as speed dials, bookmarks, tabs and a Password manager, the latest version offers improved page layout on high-end Android handsets with large screens.
“Opera Mini 5.1 for the Android platform is the next step in bringing the world’s most popular mobile web browser to all major platforms, offering improved performance and great web experience to almost any handset,” said Lars Boilesen, chief executive officer, Opera Software, in a company statement.
Indiatimes launches voice based social networking service Hibuddy for mobile subscribers
Indiatimes has announced the launch of Hibuddy, a voice based social networking and blogging service for mobile users.
Users need to call 58888199 and create their own voice channel through which they can connect to other users with similar interests. Users don’t need to be connected to the internet to avail of this service.
Speaking about Hibuddy, Rishi Khiani, chief executive officer, Times Internet (Indiatimes), said: “Social networking and blogging has seen rapid growth in India. This service will extend the growth for mobile phone users. This will allow users to connect to one another in real time through social interactions on voice, which is a more personal medium. I feel Hibuddy should be the next big thing in social networking and voice blogging in India”
Another offering with this service is the ability to voice blog, wherein users can showcase their talent through voice by sharing jokes, shayari, astrology, stock tips or anything they feel they are good at. Other users who are looking for this content can then follow these channels. Users will be able to join groups/forums to share similar interests with friends and potential friends.
Hibuddy will offer channels like Shivani ki chatpati duniya where people can exchange instant recipes; Kabeer ka PJ world where people can share jokes and laughter; Shweta ke gossip golgappe ; Sid ka Biking world to get tips on snazzy cars and bikes; and Saurabh ki Love ki pathshala for dating tips. Currently, the service is available only on the RCom mobile network, but will soon be available on many more networks.