Mobile For Rural Connectivity- Issues And Strategies

MOBILE FOR RURAL CONNECTIVITY- ISSUES AND STRATEGIES Content Introduction Definition History Growth Scope Electronic agriculture Indian rural market Linkage between telecom and rural areas Rural community telecommunication architecture Improving market access Four A’s model Successful experience in telecom Mobile revolution Case study Technical and Social challenges Strategies Conclusion References

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MOBILE FOR RURAL CONNECTIVITY- ISSUES AND STRATEGIES Introduction

Rural markets in India constitute a wide and untapped market for many products and services which are being marketed for the urban masses. There is a demand for telecommunication services to be provided to in these areas. Till now it was government which was trying to reach the villages through various initiates, but the rural tele-density is very poor and can be improved only through the introduction of modern and suitable technology along with participation from the private operators. Mobile phone ownership in India is growing rapidly, six million new mobile subscriptions are added each month and one in five Indian's will own a phone by the end of 2007. By the end of 2008, three quarters of India's population will be covered by a mobile network. Many of these new "mobile citizens" live in poorer and more rural areas with scarce infrastructure and facilities, high illiteracy levels, low PC and internet penetration. The study looks at how their new mobility could be used to bridge the growing economic and social digital divide between rural and urban areas. The first section would give a brief introduction to rural markets in India and the current status of telecommunication services. Section two talks about the linkage which exists between the telecommunication services and development, followed by a detailed section on the Bottom of the pyramid and 4 As model to address rural telecommunication issues. Next section looks at the successful experiences of four countries in rural telecommunication in rural areas. In the conclusion the implications are brought out for the Indian market. M-learning M-learning, or "mobile learning", now commonly abbreviated to "mLearning", has different meanings for different communities. Although related to e-learning and distance education, it is distinct in its focus on learning across contexts and learning with mobile devices. Definition: Learning that happens across locations, or that takes advantage of learning opportunities offered by portable technologies.

The term covers: learning with portable technologies, where the focus is on the technology (which could be in a fixed location, such as a classroom); learning across contexts, where the focus is on the mobility of the learner, interacting with portable or fixed technology; and learning in a mobile society, with a focus on how society and its institutions can accommodate and support the learning of an increasingly mobile population that is not satisfied with existing learning methodologies History 1970s and 1980s Alan Kay and colleagues in the Learning Research Group at Xerox Palo Alto Research Center [PARC] propose the Dynabook as a book-sized computer to run dynamic simulations for learning. Their interim Dynabooks are the first networked workstations. 1990s Universities in Europe and Asia develop and evaluate mobile learning for students. Palm corporation offers grants to universities and companies who create and test the use of mobile learning on the PalmOS platform. Palm Education Pioneers project. 2000s The European Commission funds the major multi-national MOBIlearn and M-Learning projects. Companies were formed that specialise in three core areas of mobile learning. 1. Authoring and publishing 2. Delivery and Tracking 3. Content Development Conferences and trade shows were created to specifically deal with mobile learning and handheld education, including: mLearn, WMUTE, and IADIS Mobile Learning international conference series, ICML in Jordan, Mobile Learning in Malaysia, Handheld Learning in London, SALT Mobile in USA. Growth Over the past ten years mobile learning has grown from a minor research interest to a set of significant projects in schools, workplaces, museums, cities and rural areas around the world. The mLearning community is still fragmented, with different national perspectives, differences between academia and industry, and between the school, higher education and lifelong learning sectors. Current areas of growth include: Testing, surveys, job aids and just in time learning location-based and contextual learning Social-networked mobile learning Mobile educational gaming "Lowest common denominator" mLearning to cellular phones using two way SMS messaging and voice-based CellCasting (podcasting to phones with interactive assessments) Scope The scope of mobile learning includes: 1. Children and students using handheld computers, PDAs or handheld voting systems in a classroom or lecture 2. Students using mobile devices in the classroom to enhance group collaboration among students and instructors using a Pocket 3. On the job training for someone who accesses training on a mobile device "just in time" to solve a problem or gain an update. 4. Learning in museums or galleries with handheld or wearable technologies Learning outdoors, for example on field trips. 5. The use of personal technology to support informal or lifelong learning, such as using handheld dictionaries and other devices for language learning. 6. Improving levels of literacy, numeracy and participation in education amongst young adults.

7. To provide audiovisual support in order to enhance training that has been provided in a corporate business or other classroom environment. Electronic agriculture E-Agriculture is a new term and its scope is expected to evolve with time. It involves conceptualization, design, development, evaluation and application of innovative ways to use ICT on agriculture. Its role in agriculture — which includes use of computers, Internet, geographical information systems, mobile phones, radio and television — was endorsed at the World Summit on the Information Society 2005. Stakeholders in agriculture industry need information and knowledge about agricultural and food production. Any system applied for getting information for making decisions in any industry should deliver accurate, complete, concise information on time. The information must be in user-friendly, easy to access, cost-effective and well protected from unauthorised accesses. ICT can help achieve greater interactivity in communicating, evaluating, producing and sharing useful information and knowledge. Indian Rural Market India lives in villages, close to 72 percent of Indian population lives in rural areas. In the country we have 6.36lakh villages out of which only 13 percent have population above 2000. The rural economy contributes nearly half of the country’s GDP (ETIG 2002-03) which is mainly agriculture driven and monsoon dependant. More than 50 percent of the sales FMCG and Durable companies come from the rural areas. The McKinsey report (2007) on the rise on consumer market in India predicts that in twenty years the rural Indian market will be larger than the total consumer markets in countries such as South Korea or Canada today, and almost four times the size of today’s urban Indian market and estimated the size of the rural market at $577 Billion. Census of India defines rural as any habitation with a population density less than 400 per sq. km., where at least 75 percent of the male working population is engaged in agriculture and where there exits no municipality or board, and the same definition being accepted for the paper here. A marketer trying to market his product or service in the rural areas is faced by many challenges; the first is posed by the geographic spread and low population density in the villages in the country. The table below gives us the population and village size details in the country. Rural Population Statistics Population Number of Villages Less than 200 114267 17.9 200-499 155123 24.3 A 159400 25 1000-1999 125758 19.7 2000-4999 69135 10.8 5000-9999 11618 1.8 10000 & above 3064 0.5 Total 636365 100

Percentage of total villages

According to NCAER 2002, the number of rural middle class house holds at 27.4 million is very close to their urban counterpart at 29.5 million. The improvement in the support prices being offered to farmers also has an impact on the disposable income with the farmers. And between, 1981-2001 there has been tremendous improvement in the literacy levels, poverty and rural housing in the villages of the country. Rural literacy levels have improved from 36 percent to 59 percent, the number of below poverty houses have declined from close to half to 46 percent and the number of pucca houses have doubled from 22 percent to 41 percent.

These figures provide us with a clear picture that rural India with the increase in agricultural income and improving standards is on the verge of becoming a large untapped market which marketers have been aspiring for a very long period of time. Thus the current status of rural markets makes it an attractive market for marketers. The next section specifically looks at the current status of rural telecom and the technology perspective Rural Telecom, current status in India According to the NCAER Rural Infrastructure Report (2007), the demand for telecommunication services are surging across rural India, as middle class and upper classes are growing in most villages but the tele-density levels are very low 1.67 per 100 residents compared with average of 8.59 overall and 25.90 in Indian cities. Table below gives us the details of the urban rural divide, Rural Urban Divide Rural Urban Mobile Phones 0.01 mn 75.685 mn Fixed Lines 13.9 mn 36.988 mn Private Operator share 0.01% 53.54% PCO’s Approx 20 Lakh Approx 35 Lakh VPTs 533,000 villages (as of Sep2005) VPTs Target Another 53,800 villages (by 2008) Total Number of Phones Approx 14 mn Approx 112 mn Teledensity Approx 2% Approx 31% Teledenisty Targets 15% (by 2007) 43% The characteristics of the rural areas, low population density and spread out population, difficult topographical and climatic conditions make it difficult to provide telecommunication service of acceptable quality by traditional means at affordable prices (CDOT, 2007). But with the development of new appropriate technology like wireless technologies have been accepted that it is possible to overcome these difficulties. Wireless technology has been proposed to be the first viable infrastructure to rural and underdeveloped areas and have therefore recommended that villages near a larger town can take advantage of the fiber backbone; a remote village can be connected via VSAT link. From the fiber backbone, a point-to-point or point-to multipoint WiMAX link can be used to connect one or more villages near the town, thus enabling WiMAX to distribute locally among all rural community groups in a given village using long distance Wi-Fi technology The technology angle to providing telecom services has been not been given much attention as it has been written on by many authors and the focus of the current paper is marketing issues related to marketing if telecom services.

Till recently it was the government which made an attempt at providing the services in rural India. The Government of India, Bharat Nirman Initiative, 200509, plans every village in the country to be connected by November 2007. The aim is to provide every village in the country with a Village Panchayat Phone (VPTs) by the year end. But the status and maintenance of the VPTs have been found to be lacking, and a large number of them have been found to be out of order and disconnected due to the non-payment of bills as villager perceive them as a free service provided by the government (Bhatnagar, 2000). And provision of one phone per village might not be abele to address the tele-density issues. The private telecom operators have been occupied with the urban market, India being the fastest growing mobile market in the world, but they have to take interest in the rural markets owing to the size and the fact that the rural markets are the ones that would provide them with the growth in future. Thus the government as provider of telecom services can only be a part of the solution and the major thrust has to

come from the private operators. Lots of studies have found a positive linkage between telecom and level of development; the next section is about the same. Linkage between Telecom and Development Core sectors of the economy which includes telecom are said to have a direct bearing on transforming consumers into producer and promote economic development. A number of studies have documented the positive impact of mobile phone adoption on rural development (Bhatnagar 2000,Waverman et.al, 2005). Telecom services would fall in the mid-space of the matrix of development versus profitability by serving low income consumers (Beshouri, 2006). Need for community based solution has been advocated by many; by tapping into local networks companies can serve low-income markets profitability (Beshouri, 2006). The successful examples of telecom in rural areas also points to the same direction, the Grameen Phone which has been successful has tapped the Microfinance network, and various ICT initiatives have taken the help of either successful cooperatives or have tied-up with a local NGO. Experiences like the Grameen Phone have shown that provision of phone connectivity to a village serves two purposes, first leads to the economic development by helping individuals and business gain economic efficiency through communications, and promoting social and economic development for individuals who own and operate the telephone enterprises (World Resource Institute, 2001). Improving market access Awareness of up-to-date market information on prices for commodities, inputs and consumer trends can improve farmers’ livelihoods substantially and have a dramatic impact on their negotiating position. Such information is important in making decisions about future crops and commodities and about the best time and place to sell and buy goods. In many countries, initiatives exist that seek to address this issue. Websites that match offer and demand of agricultural produce are part of the agricultural trade systems. Price information is collected at the main regional markets and stored in a central database. The information is published on a website, accessible to farmers via information centers. To reach a wider audience, information is broadcast via rural radio, TV and any other new media channel including the phone, thereby creating a ‘level playing field’ between producers and traders in a region. The sustainability of these systems requires attention, with an important role for the private sector and organized producer groups. Web-based trading platforms offering one-stop shop facilities are emerging, especially for main commodities. In recent years, short message and text services have taken up and effectively deliver prices and trading information via mobile phone to farmers, in Senegal, and Benin. The set-up of price and market information systems has been piloted in many developing countries. Farmers and agricultural players are being linked to factories and mills, through the use of satellite, databases and mobile phones, thereby ensuring a fair income for producers and a steady supply. Marketing Issues in Rural Telecom To address the issue of the urban and rural gap and reaching to the rural masses can be addressed by falling back on the Bottom of the Pyramid (BOP) marketing strategies and the 4 A’s Availability, Affordability, Acceptability and Awareness The BOP marketing strategies basically talk about aggregating the demand of consumers who have low individual purchasing power and are spread out. The basic commercial infrastructure suggested for the bottom of the pyramid markets constitutes of four things, creating buying power, improving access, tailoring local solutions and shaping aspirations. The 4 As model described is explained in the context of rural telecom. Each of the As is detailed out below.

4 As model Availability Availability the first A is about making the product reach the consumers and in the case of telecom services studies have shown this to be the biggest barrier to be overcome . It has been acknowledged by many that distribution systems are the most critical component and a barrier which needs to be overcome for success in marketing in rural areas. The task of distribution in these areas is considered to be more difficult than in urban areas low density of population and inaccessibility makes the problem of servicing villages individually difficult and often uneconomical. Direct delivery of goods even to the top one percent of villages cost twice as much as servicing urban markets .To overcome the difficulties posed in distribution a phased spread of the services is recommended, wherein bigger villages can be targeted first, then the ones which are near a small town and connected and last would be the remote villages. In the distribution the importance of small town markets cannot be ignored and need to be given importance as besides being a point of distribution they can also be used for promoting products as villagers tend to come to the town frequently for either purchase of agricultural inputs or sale of their produce. The second component of recharge also needs to be tailored according to the needs of rural masses. The availability of disposable income in rural areas is cyclical relate to agricultural cycles and thus the recharge coupons provided in the urban areas might not be suited to the needs to farmers and the promotions and schemes to be used in these markets also need to be in accordance with the agricultural cycles. And it has been shown through the success of single use small packs that the cost per-use is more important than the cost of the overall product or service. Acceptability Acceptability issues would include issues needed to be addressed to improve the willingness to consume distribute or sell a product. It would also include how the product or service could be made more acceptable to the rural consumers by incorporating features which would make it attractive to them. With a telecom service there are two basic components of the service one being the handset and second being the recharge coupons. Innovation is needed at both the ends to be able to tackle both the issues. Affordability Affordability issues in telecom would include two sets of issues, the first being a fixed cost and an initial barrier for a villager to start with the service needs to be brought down and many companies including the market leader Nokia are working on low cost handsets which could be of use in rural areas. Within the product there is a need for customization in terms of language and user friendliness. The rural population where illiteracy is very high needs to be taken into consideration before coming out with the product and the feature which would be included in the product need to be rethought; the needs of rural consumer need to be taken into consideration. In a rural area a radio combined with a mobile might make more sense to the rural consumer than perhaps a camera. And while designing the phone one needs to keep the problems related to the power shortages in the villages. Awareness Awareness is linked to the issues of promotion of telecom services in rural areas. The promotion of the services also needs to be adapted to the village environment; the language and means of communication used should be in the local language. The best places to promote the services could be the local haats and melas which is frequented by the villagers, the local festivals should also be included in the

promotional plan, so should be the agricultural cycles. Studies have shown that the communication needs of rural consumers are limited, in a study done by ICICI (1998) they found that nearly 70% of the outgoing traffic from rural areas is meant for a destination within the district. Of this 40% remained within the Taluk. Only 20% traffic goes to another district and hardly 10% to another State. International calls represent less than 1% of the traffic. The needs would go beyond basic commutation needs and initiatives like one by Reliance Telecom services which helps farmers ascertain market prices (Beshouri, 2006) should provide us with a pointer. Lastly, issue of proper segmenting and targeting of village consumers should also be addressed. Rural India is not a homogenous mass, but there are pockets of prosperous villages and areas in the country and within villages the purchasing capacity of the villagers vary and the products to be offered need to be tailored to their needs.. Successful Experiences in Rural Telecom The table below summaries the four experiences of success rural telecom services provided in rural areas. The first one if the Grameen Phone experience in Bangladesh which is based on a share access model and has been successfully extended to other countries also. Second is the experience of Smart Communication Inc and how it adapted its services in rural areas if Philippines and improved the penetration of mobile services in the country. Third is the experience of rural communication in Chile and the constructive role that the government played in the scripting the success story there and last is the experience in Africa, the success story which has been documented by many researchers. The Grameen Phone experiences show the importance of relying on a existing institutional infrastructure of the Microfinance helped it in succeeding and the use of a share access model. Similar initiatives on tying up the rural telecom initiative in the country to some exiting Institutional Infrastructure like cooperatives or Microfinance institutions and NGOs would ensure more sustainable success of the launch of the services. And the Experience of Smart Communications Inc in Philippines reemphasizes the importance of making the services affordable by innovations in both service delivery as well as pricing of services. Learning form the Chile experience shows us that government too needs to play a constructive role, and the African experience highlights the importance of low cost handsets in the expansion of services. Rural Telecom Success Stories Example Salient Features Reasons for success Bangladesh – Grameen Phone ( Grameen Foundation 2005, World Resource Institute, 2001) - Captured 63% of the country’s Mobile market - Average of 60 customers use each phone and average monthly bills amount upto $144.02 in 2000. - Model has been extended to Uganda - Share access business model - A cadre of phone entrepreneurs - Effective use of the Microfinance network for promoting Grameen Phone. - Use of GSM Technology - Significant subsidy being given to the service Philippines – Smart Communications Inc (Anderson & Billou, 2007, Anderson et.al, 2005). - Mobile penetration at 30% by 2004 and expected to reach 70 % by 2008. - Use of Innovative over the air payment system to overcome the availability problems -Developed smaller denominations of recharge -Use of used handsets reduced barriers to ownership. Rural Communications – Chile (Wellenius, 2002) -From 1995-2002 reduced the population living without access to basic voice communication from 15 to 1 percent - Reliance in market forces and minimum regulations - Simple and relatively expeditious processing - Effective Government leadership

African Experience in Mobile Telephony (Vodafone 2006, ITU 2006) - 15 million mobile subscribers added to subscriber base in 2004, equivalent to total number of telephone subscribers in 1996 - Mobile penetration three times the land line at 9.1 per 100 inhabitants - 75 % of all African telephone subscribers are Mobile - Use of Mobile technology to leap-frog the older technologies -Ability of Mobile operators to provide mobile coverage rapidly - High degree of liberalization and competition in the mobile sector - Reduction in Tariff combined with “ultra-low-cost” Handsets and availability of prepaid service Community Wireless Networks—linking phones, not computers. The challenge in rural communities is to both build demand and to aggregate that demand. Aggregating demand is the role a community wireless network, but building that network around voice services is critical to building demand—in large part because phones are easy to use, have low maintenance costs, and can support a wide range of voice-based and data services. Person-to-person communications has historically been the killer-app for telecommunication services and, in a rural context where literacy rates are low and most information needs are basic, demand for person-to-person communications is likely to remain primary. The new model for community networks is based around Voice Over Internet Protocol (VOIP) telephony that sends voice traffic as data using the Internet’s efficient packet-switching system rather than the circuit-switching system of traditional telephony. The phones themselves can either be traditional phones attached to a small conversion box or Wi-Fi phones that have the voice-to-data conversion built into the handset itself and connect wirelessly with a community Wi-Fi network, or even multi-mode cellular phones that have Wi-Fi chips built into them and can work on either cellular or Wi-Fi networks (see Addendum A). The key point is that phones on a VOIP system are Internet devices and use network capacity much more frugally than traditional phones—lowering bandwidth requirements and costs dramatically. Conversion boxes already cost less than $50, and the chipset required to connect to a Wi-Fi network costs about $15; Wi-Fi phones incorporating both are entering volume production and are expected to cost $50 or less within a year New peer-to-peer networking software can set up or “switch” a VOIP phone call, and these “soft” switches are efficient enough to handle hundreds of thousands of calls on a single PC located anywhere on the Internet. The VOIP data traffic, however, travels directly between the two “peered” phones. That is important, because historically about 60% of voice traffic in local networks stays local— within the community—and thus uses only the local network capacity, another source of significant cost savings. The community network that links the VOIP phones, in the new model, is a Wi-Fi fixed wireless network—either a single hotspot or a series of interconnected Wi-Fi nodes. Wi-Fi equipment is already a commodity, making the costs of such a network far lower than any other wireless network. In the most sophisticated version of a community network, the Wi-Fi nodes are a smart, “mesh” network that automatically finds and links with other nodes, routes signals in the most efficient manner, and can connect efficiently over a dozen hops in any direction—enabling coverage of an extended community. Moreover, some mesh equipment is designed for very low power and comes with solar panels and built-in battery storage. Such networks can be deployed “out of the box”, on poles or rooftops, without need for local power—and are thus ideally suited to rural conditions. Although VOIP phones may be the main devices on such a network, the network can also support any other Wi-Fi-ready device—handheld computers, laptops, or PCs— enabling a wide variety of Internet services to be deployed if demand warrants. The New Model for a Rural Community Telco

USAID’s Darrell Owen has done a good job laying out the components of a fullyfunctional community-based telecommunications network built to serve the latent demands for local-community voice communications as described above. These include 1) an Internet Protocol (IP) network in lieu of a circuit switched network, 2) voice services that are provided through VoIP in lieu of custom hardware-based switching, 3) wireless distribution, be it Wi-Fi or WiMAX or, for the more remote locations, VSAT links for connecting the rural system to the Internet

In this model, the local network is easily deployed, provides multiple telephony access points for both inter-community and long distance calling in addition to supporting data. The use of off-the-shelf technologies allows this to be done at a cost that is literally pennies-on-the-dollar compared to what has been possible in the past. There are several options for providing these services to the local community. One obvious approach is to upgrade an existing telecenter to become a true “last mile” solution provider by focusing on voice services, and delivering expanded access into the community through selected businesses or even homes that serve as “phone shops” for the immediate neighbors. For existing or future telecenters that become local community telcos, additional earnings will help maintain operations while demand for pure data services steadily increases. There are a number of mobile-enabled services that have already been deployed in emerging markets. Agricultural Services Agriculture information portals are reaching new audiences with mobiles. The Kenya Agricultural Commodity Exchange (KACE)10, in conjunction with mobile telephone company Safaricom, has developed an SMS system to give farmers access to market prices. FOODNET11 provides a similar service to farmers in East and Central Africa. The SMS systems allow farmers to bypass exploitative middlemen, who often charge below-market rates to farmers with few other options in terms of crop sales. In addition, the system will help farmers manage their trips to market, which can become expensive in terms of travel costs and lost time in the fields. Other companies provide the SMS service to drive traffic to their other online offerings. In the Philippines, B2Bpricenow.com12 runs an e-marketplace through which farmers and cooperatives can market their wares, bypassing traditional trader networks that often manipulate market prices. Agriwatch13 provides commodity research reports, industry news, and runs an online auction for Indian producers and suppliers. Subscription costs for the services are minimal and can be split between a group of farmers that share the information. Financial Services Cell phones are increasingly being used to make financial transactions. In South Africa, for example, the WIZZIT3 banking facility allows account holders to user their mobile to remit money to a friend, buy airtime, or pay accounts. The service was developed specifically to provide the unbanked and underbanked with an affordable alternative to mainstream bank offerings, and has no monthly fees and no minimum balance requirements. Two companies from the Philippines have also rolled out similar plans. Globe Telecom’s G-Cash4 service allows subscribers to transfer funds domestically and internationally and make payments via texting. Authorized G-Cash outlets let users load or withdraw cash from their phones and receive international remittances. Another, SMART Communications5 has enabled electronic sales of small increments of pre-paid airtime via SMS, creating a business opportunity for 450,000 entrepreneurs. In partnership with Mastercard, the company also launched Smart

Money, a service which enables users to transfer money from a bank account to a Smart Money account. Subscribers can then use their Smart Money card like a debit card, or transfer money via SMS to another user’s card. Health Services Mobile-enabled health applications can be used for both disease management and prevention. In South Africa, On-Cue Compliance14 uses an SMS-based service to help reduce reoccurring medical problems that arise when people forget to take their medications. The company sends timely reminders to their cell phones using a low-cost open source software operating system. The system is currently being used in the treatment of tuberculosis patients in Cape Town with almost a 100% success rate. Also in South Africa, Cell-Life15 has implemented a similar platform to improve the monitoring and treatment of HIV and other diseases. Health workers in the field use their cell phones to record patient data, improving efficiency and treatment, and lowering per-patient costs. The for-profit Voxiva16 has developed and implemented a technology platform that enables medical professionals to collect data in real-time and communicate with one another in order to effect change based on the data. By leveraging the web, phone, fax, email and SMS, the company provides a customizable solution that works over any voice or data system. Voxiva has worked with diverse partners to develop solutions to detect disease outbreaks, support HIV/AIDS care and treatment, monitor patients, track critical supplies, and enhance program management in some of the most challenging environments in the world including Rwanda, Iraq and posttsunami South India. But for many people in poor countries, mobile phones are a tool that can help them climb out of poverty. The mobile phone technology is being used creatively in poor countries to help spur development and reduce poverty, particularly in remote rural areas. Getting the Right Price Mobile phones help people connect with markets: letting buyers call around to adjacent villages to check where the best deals are, while allowing producers to price their wares more accurately. After mobile phones were made available to fishermen in Kerala, India, they were able to call several markets and agree on selling prices before landing their fish. Within a few weeks the fluctuation in fish prices subsided, increasing the fishermen's profit by 9% and reducing consumer prices by 4%. Bringing Banking Services Access to traditional banking services is costly and limited in rural areas in poor countries. This means that many people are forced to rely solely on cash, which is not only inconvenient, but limits their business opportunities. Mobile phones are helping to change that by providing banking services to the "unbanked" over the mobile networks. The use of this technology is still in its infancy, but its potential is huge. Some examples. In the Philippines, microfinance customers of rural banks can use G-Cash, a service of Globe Telecom, to repay their loans, without visiting the nearest bank branch which can often be far away. Customers make their monthly loan payments by simply sending a text message with their available G-cash. Teba Bank of South Africa uses existing mobile phone technology to provide lowcost, electronic banking services (savings and payments) for poor customers. The program was originally developed to handle wage payments for migrant workers. In the Democratic Republic of Congo and Zambia, clients use their mobile phones to pay bills. The client establishes an account with Celpay and then can make purchases by texting a request to Celpay, which will transfer money to the merchant's account. Security is provided by the use of a personal identification number, which is needed to complete the transaction.

Providing Income for Poor Women People in rural areas have turned owning a mobile phone into a small-scale business, by renting the phone to others and charging for its use. For many poor, disenfranchised women this has become a reliable source of income. In Bangladesh, the Village Phone not only gives the villagers access to phone, but empowers women operators, spurs economic activity and promotes entrepreneurialism. Started by Grameen Phone, Village Phones has 280,000 cellphones in some 55,000 Bangladeshi villages. Transport Finding cost-effective, reliable, and safe ways to transport goods and services to market is a major problem for small businesses in rural communities. Public transport is not available in 45% of villages in India, and only 1% of Indian households own a vehicle. Mobile communication could be used to create and co-ordinate car sharing schemes amongst villages, and provide real-time information about public transport services and the ability to make request stops. Micro-commerce Small businesses in rural areas often have to travel significant distances to markets or other places they can distribute their goods, and cannot make arrangements in advance with buyers or other sellers. Mobile phones could significantly change the logistical issues faced by rural traders and home entrepreneurs, by affording mobile-based ordering systems, delivery requests, and the ability to make more reliable and advance arrangements with business partners or clients. Finance Mobile phones are already being used in rural areas as a tool for financial transactions by swapping airtime for goods and services. The study encourages mobile networks and financial services institutions to work together to test and develop new financial services in this area and address how people can transfer these credits into cash. Governance Accessing information about public services remains a major challenge for many rural communities. Mobile phones provide a new platform through which rural communities will be able to access government information and services, using text, data, and audio browsing techniques. Education The study looks at a range of educational services that could be provided via mobiles to children in remote villages and communities, particularly where PCs or connections to the internet are not available. Mobile phones could serve as an essential means for children to become connected to one another for educational and peer-learning activities. These are particularly important for communities that are either nomadic or transitional on account of displacements due to a natural disaster or for other reasons. Infotainment While the mainstream entertainment industry is already well aware of the emerging potential of mobile media, there are also many opportunities for local, peer-topeer content to be created and distributed, affording new cultural and economic opportunities to rural communities. The research is based on detailed ethnography and participant observation among communities living in three rural areas of India - Badaun in the state of Uttar Pradesh, Satara in the state of Maharashtra and Chittradurga in the state of

Karnataka - as well as one urban area, Bangalore. Researchers meet with small business owners, farmers, home owners and others to understand how mobile communication has already transformed their daily lives and the further potential of mobile communications to enhance livelihoods. Multi-Sector Platforms As a software development company, Voxiva can readily adapt its tools for new applications. For example, the company helped NGOs and governments coordinate relief efforts and allocate resources in Indonesia’s tsunami-ravaged Aceh Province. The Voxiva system is also being used to increase citizen participation in order to monitor, respond to and reduce crime in Peru. WorldTalk17 is another multi-sector platform. It delivers ondemand audio-based information over existing telephone networks and in the locallanguage. The system is designed to inexpensively provide reliable, up-to-date information in areas where literacy levels are low, computer access is limited, and local government services are overloaded. By providing information on issues such as housing, health, market pricing, legal rights, and employment, WorldTalk enables people in poor communities to improve their living conditions and develop themselves. The non-profit is currently piloting projects in South Africa and India. What’s interesting about WorldTalk and Voxiva is that essentially they are both customized software applications running on increasingly inexpensive hardware. With these basic platforms, there is no limit to the applications that could be developed to meet specific community needs Thousands of people from rural areas across 12 states are likely to get their social security pension and wages paid under the National Rural Employment Guarantee Act (NREGA) scheme with the help of mobiles over the coming few months. In Andhra Pradesh alone, for instance, 250,000 people have registered for mobile banking services. The state government is rolling out a programmed to enroll three million people by the end of 2008. Mobile banking pilots and full-scale operations are being conducted across 12 states, and the entire ecosystem is being managed by the government with the help of the Reserve Bank of India, banks, leading telecom operators and technology implementation partners. The ecosystem is important since banking regulations in India currently do not allow cash for exchange of another 'unit' such as 'airtime' in the case of mobiles. Only banks and the Indian Post (through money orders) are currently allowed such transfers. Mobile banking, which is catching up fast in the cities and hinterland, is not only helping the government to take a step forward towards fulfilling its aim of having one bank account for every household, but also saving it crores of rupees by way of reduced transaction costs. While the government incurs a transaction cost of Rs 12-13 for every Rs 100 it shells out, mobile banking helps it reduce the cost to a mere Rs 2. RBI estimates that around 40 per cent of Indians lack access to formal financial services and are largely 'unbanked'. For instance, the AP government has tied up with banks like the State Bank of India , Union Bank of India , Axis Bank, Andhra Bank , State Bank of Hyderabad,Andhra Pradesh Grameen Vikas Bank, and Punjab National Bank A Little World ALW, a technology implementation partner, has collaborated with NXP Semiconductors to design a mobile for the AP government that encloses an RFID card, and works with ALW's micro-banking platform ZERO. The mobile acts as a branch of the bank by storing a database of customers. It also has a smartcard, which biometrically stores the identity of the customer such as name, address, photograph, fingerprint templates and relevant details of the savings or loan accounts held by the issuing bank. Customers get a secure electronic identity via phone or smartcard, while agents

take deposits and dispense cash. ALW works with the banks on a revenue-sharing basis. Anurag Gupta, founder director & CEO of ALW, says: "We have carried out pilot projects with SBI in villages located in some of the most inaccessible and difficult terrains of the country such as Pithoragarh in Uttarakhand, Mizoram, Meghalaya, and remote villages in Andhra Pradesh." Lokanath Panda, director, ALW, also pointed out that SBI had tied up with the Indian Post to extend banking services especially in unbanked/under-banked areas. "Select post offices will make available to the public SBI's deposit and loan products, and ALW is the technology partner." ALW is also conducting a pilot programme with SKS Microfinance and the Bank of India to provide a mobile banking service that works on BSNL SIM cards. New Delhi-based Ekgaon Technologies too has developed a system for tracking transactions made by self-help groups. It has partnered with the likes of CARE, WorldVision and the World Bank to conduct a pilot, which it plans to extend to 14 Indian states. Bharti Airtel , too, is in the process of tying up with two leading banks to extend its mobile remittance services to rural areas, according to its president (Mobile Services), Sanjay Kapoor. Airtel has already partnered with the Indian Farmers' Fertiliser Cooperative Limited (IFFCO) to set up IFFCO Kisan Sanchar Limited in Rajasthan. Under this initiative, the cooperative department will provide mobile handsets to farmers at marginal price through its outlets in the rural areas. These handsets would be loaded with green SIM cards, which will flash daily updates on agricultural practices and weather forecast free of cost. While he did not provide details, Kapoor hinted that the partnership deal would be extended to mobile banking services too. Kapoor reasons that with 55 per cent of the mobiles being internet-enabled, mobile banking would help bridge the digital divide. Reliance Communications on its part, allows ICICI Bank account holders with Reliance handsets (even the low-end Rs 1,000 ones - with or without Internet connectivity) to make intra-bank (to ICICI account holders) money transfers. It has already tied up with HDFC to offer Reliance mPay - a virtual credit card Mobile Telephony Innovative business models It is a tribute to the industry that the operators have managed to remain profitable despite a low tariff regime, writes ManoJ Kohll In the pre-liberalisation days, India's telecom growth remained hindered by an elitist bias. Telephone was considered a luxury and was treated as the exclusive preserve of the rich. The customer base, which stood at 80,000 in 1948, had grown to a mere five million by 1991, the year the country began its historic journey towards market economy. The telecom revolution typically represents the country's post 1991 economic transformation — from a hesitant beginning to explosive growth. Today there are over 2 70 million telecom subscribers. This mobile telephony led revolution is spreading to every corner of the country and over eight million mobile subscribers sign up for services every month. Over the last decade, not only has India emerged as the fastest growing mobile market but also as one of the largest in terms of customers. Part of change process This revolution should ideally be seen as a part of the wider change process ushered in by India's liberalisation drive, which opened many areas to private entrepreneurs. In telecom service, mobile telephony was the first to see private entrepreneurs in 1995. Bharti Airtel was a pioneer in the sector when it launched its services in Delhi. Then nobody had anticipated this new technology to be such a powerful trigger for change — connecting people across urban and rural India and in turn contributing to the economic development of the country.

Despite the initial enthusiasm among customers, mobile growth was extremely sluggish in the early years. In fact it took three years to reach a total customer base of a million. Obviously it was tough going for the operators. Out of the 25 early entrants only three survive today. Most of them sold out. A few of them even collapsed. Some of them got merged to form bigger entities in the marketplace. Airtel's success in those early days was clearly built around its aggressive network expansion strategy and constant focus on customer service. Falling tariffs As tariffs dropped progressively from a peak of twenty cents to less than two cents a minute, the lowest ever witnessed anywhere in the world, the sector witnessed rapid customer additions. Some of the innovative strategies that opened the floodgates came in the shape of tariff plans like Life Time Prepaid, which managed to rope in hordes of lower middle class consumers into the network. Complementing these tariff plans, prices of handsets too fell significantly bringing down the entry cost for new customers. Today, one can see a rickshaw puller or a daily wage labourer talking on his mobile phone and experiencing the benefits of telephony. Low tariffs had however created a challenge of survival for the operators. They had to bring in all their innovative skills to stay afloat. It is a tribute to the industry that the operators have managed to remain profitable despite this low a tariff regime. Here is an example of how Airtel innovated a business model to meet the low tariff challenge. In 2004, for the first time in the global telecom history, the company struck some remarkable outsourcing deals. It put out its entire IT piece in the hands of IBM. Right from the desktop or laptop on the CEO's desk to the most complex piece of IT, it was given out to the company in one swoop. It was a $750 million contract for a period of eight years. The company also outsourced its networks from Ericsson and Nokia. Under the contract it was not to pay for the hardware they installed. Instead it was to pay for the traffic coming out of these networks. It was a unique and unusual model. It had obvious business risks embedded in it. But it also had the potential to open up new frontiers in telecom network management and growth. Diversified role Alongside low tariffs and low handset prices what is fuelling today's mobile growth however is the innovative use of the device. It has assumed a muchdiversified role in our lives. Selling at village pan shops like pouches of chewing tobacco, mobile connections constitute modern India's most powerful movement that touches the lives of the ordinary and the powerful in the same vein. A service like SMS has clearly added a new dimension to communication. Value Added Services like ring back tones and music downloads have transformed the phone into a potent entertainment and lifestyle device. A mobile phone today obviously is a much more versatile gadget than the fixed line voice only phone or even the mobile phones of the early days. All the mobile operators have of course had rapid Rapid expansion in geographical coverage will hold the key for meeting the Government's target of reaching the 500 million customer mark by 2010 growth through the years. But Airtel has on tpaced. its competitors and raised its market share consistently. In this journey of leadership innovation has remained its primary pillar of success. The company has time and again proved this in the market through the introduction of innovative services. It achieved global recognition through its unique business model based on outsourcing. The model was admired as it not only helped control cost but enabled it to scale up rapidly. Rural coverage In mobile telephony geographical coverage is a critical issue. .Telecom companies in India are committed to connect the remote corners of the country, reaching out to places where bridges, roads, trains and planes have not reached yet. Their commitment is being reflected in the rapid growth in rural telephony in the country over the last few years. Airtel's network already reaches more than three

lakh villages. In the next two years the company will substantially cover the balance of rural India. Rapid expansion in geographical coverage will hold the key for meeting the Government's target of reaching the 500-million customer mark by 2010. The epicenter of mobile growth has started shifting from the metros. For instance, in the GSM segment we already have witnessed a sharer rise in demand in the A, B and C circles as compared to the metro circles in 2007. These have grown at 67 per cent, 68 per cent and 74 per cent respectively as compared to 40 per cent in the metro circles. The trend is likely to accelerate in the coming years, impelling the operators to focus more on rural areas. Infrastructure sharing Infrastructure sharing among operators is going to play a critical role in the sector's drive towards affordability and financial viability of the operators, in the next phase of telecom expansion. This already has acquired some momentum with the various telcos de-merging their passive infrastructure into separate companies. This will enable them to derive economies of scale. The standalone telecom infrastructure companies will help the Indian telecom industry to reach the next level by facilitating a faster roll out in rural areas with low customer densities. Airtel is particularly well placed having merged its tower business in 16 of the telecom circles with that of other leaders like Vodafone and Idea. The new company called Indus Towers, with 70,000 towers under its control, will play an important role in the next phase of mobile roll out. Airtel's separate tower company, In-fratel. will be managing its towers in the rest of the seven circles. As mentioned earlier, affordability remains the primary driver for Indian telecom as operators explore the bottom of the pyramid more vigorously. Despite the fact that Indian telecom tariff is already the lowest in the world, operators will continue to revisit tariffs whenever they have an opportunity and try to move from two cents per minute to one cent in the next couple of years. But to do so, they will of course be expecting a helping hand from the Government. Highly taxed segment Taxation and levies on the Indian telecom sector are among the highest globally and account for close to 30 per cent of the operators' revenue. These include licence fees, ADC and service tax. Some relief on this will provide the required impetus to growth. The other issue on which the operators will be seeking more clarity from the Government and the regulator is allocation of additional spectrum to current and new players in the segment. Overhanging uncertainty on this could affect the healthy growth of the industry. Since it also impacts consumer interest, it will be appropriate if the Government comes to a judicious decision after consulting the operators. Going forward, customer friendly regulatory changes will be an absolute necessity to unlock the full potential of the sector. It is now more or less established that mobile penetration and GDP growth are positively correlated. According to a recent study by Leonard Waverman of the London Business School, every additional 10 percentage point penetration in mobile phone in a typical developing country adds an extra 0.44 percentage points of GDP growth. This macro economic impact may not appear huge but the cumulative impact could be substantial in achieving the "inclusive growth" in the long run. Value added services There is going to be a significant shift in the level of customer focus and new product offerings in the sector in the coming years. Money transfer over the mobile and m-commerce are tipped to be the next best thing to happen after SMS and Hello Tunes. Airtel in partnership with the global money transfer major Western Union will soon launch this service. This will enable millions of Indians working abroad to easily transfer money to their families back in India via their mobile phones. They can actually transfer amounts as low as $100. Alongside low tariff and low handset prices what is fuelling today's mobile growth

is the innovative use of the device. M-Commerce is soon going to be a highly popular service offering, particularly in the high-value markets. Last year, Airtel launched mobile ticketing and today it has a customer base of one lakh unique customers, benefiting from the service (with 75 per cent repeat usage). Similarly, both airline ticketing and train ticketing will be increasingly made available to mobile consumers. Managing travel bookings over the mobile will truly be a great experience for the Indian consumer. Year of Broadband The Year 2007 was declared the Year of Broadband by the Government. The intense focus has seen the sector grow by over 30 per cent from a customer base of 2.10 million in the previous year. In the coming years broadband experience of the consumer will markedly, particularly, in terms of diversification of the service portfolio. Airtel has recently launched 8 mbps for its broadband customers and is gearing up to offer 16 mbps in the near future. The expansion of the sector will be driven by new service introductions in the space of educational content, gaming, music and movies. The urban* consumer's desire for music, entertainment, sports and games will be fulfilled through new service introductions. With the launch of DTK and IPTV, 'Triple play' will become a reality with telecom companies offering voice, data and video services to their consumers. The impact of telecom on the economy goes beyond mere connectivity. This will be increasingly appreciated in the coming years as its impact becomes more visible on the common man. Telecom will continue to generate both direct and indirect employment opportunities for millions of youth in areas like manufacturing, telecom, BPOs, ancillaries, channel distribution, branding and infrastructure labour. But its biggest impact will be felt in the area of entrepreneurship development. From farmers to fishermen, from the vehicle mechanic to the neighbourhood plumber, everyone has found a way to leverage the device to improve his life. The omnipresent device clearly has the potential to nurture millions of entrepreneurial dreams across rural and urban India, who could prove to be a critical pivot around which India's economic transformation will shape up. After four years of sustained growth, the Indian economy is clearly looking up to double digit growth. As the poster boy of Indian reforms, telecom too has remained remarkably upbeat through these years. Given the strong fundamentals of the economy, one can expect strong, continued growth for the sector. The industry will not only be able to maintain this rapid pace of penetration but will also make telephony a more wholesome experience its customers. The Indian telecom market will also be teaching new ways of working to global operators. The new business models and the innovative services will create new benchmarks for others. Telecom Services Meeting the rural needs An under-developed infrastructure and non-viability are given as the main reasons for poor tele-density in rural areas, writes A new era of communications in the form of mobile communications dawned with the analog version way back in the 1980s, and then moved to the digital version. At present basic wideband (low data rate-2G) digital versions exist in the market. In the near future India will witness higher data rates (3G) coupled with various services such as multimedia, fast internet access and application specific services. This will be followed by wideband data rates coupled with various services such as location based service, personalized multimedia facilities, other applications, radio, live video with quality, E2E security, mobile-pay and so on. Furthermore, there are many encouraging trends in the mobile communication environment though there are constraints. Some of these are: There have been revolutionary changes in mobile terminals — from big gadgets to smaller and sleek trendy handsets which now come with cameras, are blue tooth enabled, have touch screens, are easy to browse, voice enabled, have soft keys and are supported by additional facilities such as address book, voice/video recording

and games. Major changes There has been a marked improvement in services from limited mobility to unlimited mobility, roaming, voice portals, and so on. Falling equipment prices, newer technologies and provision of various new services are some of the opportunities for the operators. Also, roaming and the need to be in touch are acting as catalysts for a rapid expansion of the subscriber base in the country. Customers will benefit from falling calling rates, sophisticated new handsets and falling prices of terminals. The Government has taken the initiative to increase tele-density through provision of the required spectrum to existing and new operators. However, increasing spectrum costs, license fees, high cost of equipment with new features, high acquisition costs and more competitors are constraints in meeting the demands for lower tariff, deeper penetration and increased teledensity. Rural telephony neglected While there has been a phenomenal growth of tele-density surpassing all projections in meters, cities and towns, the situation is not encouraging in achieving the minimum expected tele-density in rural areas. There are over 260 million telephone connections in India; but rural India is lagging behind urban centers. Rural tele-density is only 3.5 per cent (against the national average of 16.6 per cent); there are no telephone connections in over 30,000 villages. The burgeoning telephone networks the world over in the last five years have had their impact on the Indian telecom scene. Growth Growth of telephony in a country is measured by its tele-density which is measured as the number of telephones per hundred populations. India took more than 100 long years to reach a tele-density of 1 after the first telephone connection was laid in 1881 but it took only a few years to leap to the present figure of 16.6. There is however reason to despair as the rural tele-density is very low. A striking attribute of the urban sector is the extraordinary rate of growth of mobile subscribers in the last two years. There is also the new phenomenon of people acquiring more than one cell phone. The reduction in tariff by 90 per cent and in instrument costs has contributed to the dynamic growth of cell phones. A mammoth task before the Government is to reach out to the rural masses, constituting 75 per cent of the population. The four metros account for 20.6 per cent of the total telephone connections (mobile and fixed put together) in the country whereas their population has only a 4.7 per cent share. To bridge the gap, more focused and streamlined telecom infrastructure efforts are required. An under-developed infrastructure and non-viability are given as the main reasons for poor tele-density in rural areas. While there are various focused initiatives from the government, they are yet to yield the desired results. Other reasons for the low rural telephone network are poor transmission media availability to connect to the network, small customer base and low per capita income. In rural areas, the expectations are affordable handsets and tariffs and wide coverage. These factors do not make investments attractive for operators. The problem has to be tackled from two angles. Operators can offer applications that are of use to fanners, local language-based instruments that are convenient to use along with subsidized handsets and lower tariff that will aid rural market growth. The other focus could be from the government which can subsidize the transmission media cost to connect to networks, lower spectrum cost, taxes and power tariffs which will enable operators to provide the connectivity. While the operators are trying to reduce the digital divide and developing some

applications such as provision of commodity prices, weather information and fishing information there is still a long way to go. Positive trends With serious efforts from the operators and the Government there is every opportunity for more attractive returns on investment. An active catalyst for this is the increasing mobility of the rural population, the need to be in line with urban citizens and increasing per capita income, more interested operators and associated competition and falling handset prices which will lead to an increased tele-density in rural India. A connected India It is imperative /or handset manufacturers to be closer to the market to create agility and flexibility in their supply chains, writes D. Slvakumar The mobility market is 14 years old in India but has had a dramatic impact in every area. India is one of the fastest growing mobility markets in the world at eight million subscriber additions every month. It is expected to contribute significantly to the next billion subscribers globally. India will contribute 25 per cent of the next billion subscribers. Why has mobility succeeded so quickly in India? Our poor infrastructure in the past. Fixed phone penetration was less than three per cent a decade ago and less than five per cent today. Two-thirds of calls made from mobiles are made from a building even today. Innovative business models Innovative business models from operators such as JJharti, Reliance, Vodafone, Idea, BSNL and the TATA. Indian operators invented a business biotech that has increased minutes of usage at a low call rate and also ensured high EBITA (earnings before interest, taxes, depreciation and amortization) Durable convergence- in a cell phone is a notable j feature. Today more Indians listen to the radio. on a', cell phone, take pictures on a cell phone and set their j alarms on" a cellphone. Cell phone brands have given tonsuniers more value rather than just voice and SMS.' Favourable policy The Government has played a stellar role in ensuring; free and fair participation here. There has been no protection of any sort. The Indian telecom market is possibly the most competitive globally, has excellent self j regulation and regulation that works. Impact of mobility The mobile phone has affected almost everyone in the Indian society. To women and children it is a safety The manufacturing story, With 660 million people from rural India stirring to capture their rightful place in the economy and to cater to burgeoning demand of the existing metro markets, it is imperative for handset manufacturers to be closer to the market to create greater agility and flexibility in their supply chains. It is for this reason that telecom manufacturing has seen unprecedented investment in manufacturing over the last few years. The Government's decision to set up special economic zones (SEZs) was aimed to support hyper growth markets like telecom. As per some reports, the Government has set a target of achieving close to $23 billion in investments in special economic zones by 2009. It is therefore natural that India has displaced even the most powerful countries as the" second most favoured destination for foreign direct investment in the world. One of the driving factors behind India's emergence as a-telecom manufacturing hub is no doubt the growing market not just within the country but also its proximity to emerging markets in the region. Another and more significant reason has been the Indian policy makers' ability to sell India as a destination for telecom manufacturing given the right policy frameworks. Also, given that the next phase of .growth will come from tier B & C cities

and towns, the price pressure will come into play. At such a time, if the manufacturing volumes are already in place, it will be easy for telecom companies to customise models to suit the Indian demand. device; to carpenters, plumbers and electricians it is a productivity device; to young people, it is a personality statement. It has relevant meaning to everyone. In developing economies, consumers on the fringes do not participate in the formal economy because they need proof of some kind - bank account, licence and the like. Mobility lets many people enter the formal economy through its sheer simplicity. MOBILE ADVANTAGE BREAKS THE BARRIER G Selvaraj1, J. Venkataprabhu2 and C.Muralidharan3 The setting In India with in a span of 10 years the usage of cellphone has increased to hundred folds from 1.2 million during 1998 to 129.5 million in 2007. Again it is increasing by adding 7 million phones every month and expected to reach by 300 million by the end of 2008 (www.dnindia.com). The spectacular increase in the usage of cell phones was noticed in recent years which no communication medium could achieve in the shortest period. Mobiles are easily accessed and the cost is cheaper, thereby, affordability is not at all a bothering factor. Mobile phones are empowered with enormous technological capabilities such a pocket radio, pocket pc, internet connectivity, remote television, SMS and emails. The cost of both mobile phone and charges declining very fast though their technical capabilities have increased. The experiences of TNAU in using mobile phones for ICT The TamilNadu Agricultural University (TNAU) being the centenary old renowned institution committed ;or quality education, research and extension education has experienced well in using the mobile phones through their clients for ICT through various mechanism. The experiences of using mobile phones by TNAU are as follows: ODL keeps accelerated place Celling is not yelling it is to inform distant learners at a far flung areas to get access to information and clarifications. As the directorate of open and distance learning encompasses 16 certificate courses along with 2 pg degree courses , enrollers are aplenty .their queries and anxiety makes them to contact then and their regarding the venue , time for personal contact programme, special sessions , mark details , result etc., by using cell phones. The distant learners located elsewhere in the country could very easily contact the coordinators of the course and aware of the details in a speedy way. Thus the cell phones role is crucial in filling the gap in information and lagging in details , safeguarding them to attend the classes on time and circumventing communication and information gap. As far as ODL class fixing and arrangements is concerned, the absenteeism of the resource persons may be efficiently managed without any hustlebustle , since the timely information to caution and to make alternate arrangements could be made possible through SMS as will as by calling in cell phones. Cell act as ready reckoner for the distant learners as well as the ODL staff Morphing into e-learning through mobile As the university is one of the premier institutes to introduce e-learning , and it is necessary for every student to possess lop-top, all transactions and timely access for information are made through SMS , whilst students are at lab/

hostels/classrooms. Sms also further learning by locating proper and relevant websites for browsing / cramming / skimming etc. Considering the importance of using cell phones for ODL programmes , the directorate of open and distance learning has organized a quick feedback survey among the open and distance learners and other final year B.Sc ( Ag.) students to elucidate their views and strategies for the effective utility of cell phones . the well structured questionnaire includes the items viz., access to international educational systems ,exchange of information like exam results, marks , general knowledge ,sharing ideas , access to photo clippings , contact with professors , storage and retrial of data , calculations , learning of new words everyday , to fix interviews with corporate , stop clock while doing experiments , unit conversions , develop languages and to maintain time table and to get remainders. A total 350 students have been asked to assemble in seven lecture halls to assess the accessibility of learning through cell phones by administering them with a questionnaire. Snow ball sampling was adopted to obtain the responses for the above said usages of the cell phone. The response obtained from the students are consolidated here under. After pooling the responses based on the criteria , the data were analysed . simple percentage was adopted to consolidate the opinions . major advantages were revealed by almost all of them and the disadvantage were almost nil as they perceived that cell is not a barrier for concentrated work and they opined it only enhanced knowledge by breaking barriers like time, cost, labour, distance and communication gaps while contacting the students to state their opinions , most of them replied that the possession of cellphones is indispensable as it is used for multifarious purposes. Among the total population of 350 , 56% replied , they could share general knowledge , whereas 48% of them said they could accommodate themselves according to reschedule of classes , visit of library , practical ,outdoor classes , experiments. Forty percent(40%) opined that they could get exam results immediately 4% of them were able to perform calculations by using mobile phones , where as 36% of them used internet by cellphones . a total of 24% believed that their word power enriched only by means of mobile and SMS Experience and domestic and export market intelligence cell – forecasting timely information This wing established under the center for agricultural rural development studies of TNAU disseminates timely and precise information to make the farmers rational decision when to grow and where to sale The cell is poised to transact sharp and succinct messages instantly , so as to caution the farmer for a wise decision making . forewarning is done at two stages for rationality in decision making. 1. presowing decision making in which the acreage of sowing can be decided , envisaging the demand of that particular commodity when it comes to market . this will enables the farmers to be shrewd enough to stabilize themselves to shrink the area under cultivation. 2. similarly after decision making which would enable the farmers to decide on whether to sell or to store and make them alert , by forecasting the remunerative market price. Access for utility by peasants Gone were those days that farmers are not accessing information and it has to go to door steps. As the younger generation farmers are more interested to take up scientific farming only that they use mobile phones for getting information on climatic forecast, forewarning of seasonal aberrations , meteorological data from the agricultural climatological center of TNAU . this enable the farmers to plan for their agronomic practices and crop based field

operations . added to that mobile is used by the farmers for timely enquiries on the availability of video CD lessons containing technological packages of new research findings. Placement cell capitalizes The placement cell of the directorate of student’s welfare , while inviting the students for registration for the first and foremost details they collect is the cell numbers. This helped them to preplan and modify the plan , informing the accurate date and time of placement interviews. At times of emergencies of contingencies of placement interviews , within a short span of time , students could be mobilized Moreover the results intimation to join the job before the deadlines was effectively done for a sizable strength of candidates , who had attended interviews. Conclusion Utility of mobile service in educational programmes to gaining momentum in recent years in developing countries like India . many experiments conducted in India , Taiwan and Africa have proved that the mobile phones are acted as a flat form to educate all sections of the people in their day to life. Moreover , this electronic medium is gaining more popularity among the ODL learners as it disseminates vast information about their study . the perceived benefit of this electronic medium viz., productivity, convenience , handy, safety, security, easy access and instant transactions between two or more clients enabled the educational institutions to aspire for improved utility of this ICT for mass communication among the learners who are scatted in length and breadth of the country Rural Connectivity: Grameen Village Pay Phones In Bangladesh, 97 percent of homes and virtually all rural villages lack a telephone, making the country one of the least wired in the world. This lack of connectivity has contributed to the underdevelopment of the country and the impoverishment of individual Bangladeshis. To address this problem, Grameen Bank, a micro-finance institution, formed two entities: 1) Grameen Telecommunications, a wholly-owned non-profit organization to provide phone services in rural areas as an income-generating activity for members of Grameen Bank, and 2) Grameen Phone Ltd., a for-profit entity that in 1996 bid on and won a national GSM cellular license. Grameen Phone has since become the country's dominant mobile carrier, providing services in urban areas and along the major railway routes via a network of cellular towers linked by fiber-optic cable. Business Model. Grameen Telecommunications has the explicit goal of helping Grameen Bank's members shift from relatively low-yield traditional ventures, like animal husbandry, into the technology sector by creating micro-enterprises that can both generate individual income and provide whole villages with connectivity. Grameen Telecommunications uses Grameen Phone's advanced GSM technology in stationary village phones owned and operated by local entrepreneurs. These entrepreneurs purchase the phones with money borrowed from Grameen Bank, and sell phone services to customers by the call. Rates are generally twice the wholesale rate charged by Grameen Phone plus taxes and airtime fees. An average of 70 customers a month uses each phone. This shared-access business model concentrates demand and creates relatively high cash flow, even in poor villages, enabling operators to make regular loan payments and still turn a profit. Repayment rates to Grameen Bank are 90-95 percent. Rural telephones are also very profitable for Grameen Phone, bringing in revenues per phone of US$93 a month in March 2001, twice as much as Grameen Phone's urban mobile phones. However, rural phones represent less than 2 percent of the phones used on Grameen Phone's network and bring in only 8 percent of the company's total revenue, the company's profitability still depending on its urban business. Infrastructure. Grameen Telecom's original goal was to have a phone in every one of Bangladesh's 65,000 villages by 2000, but only 4,543 village phones were in service as of March

2001. The primary constraint has been a distorted telecommunications market controlled by a monopolistic government provider, BTTB. Because BTTB has been unwilling to increase its interconnect capacity, despite Grameen Phone's offer to pay for the upgrading, Grameen Phone and other mobile companies have been unable to connect additional phones to the national switched network and instead have had to offer primarily mobile-to-mobile phone services This infrastructure barrier has also limited expansion of the rural phone network. A second constraint is Grameen Phone's use of cellular technology for fixed phone centers, a choice that is neither efficient nor probably competitive over the long term. GSM, used throughout much of Europe and Asia, is far more expensive than fixed wireless local loop (WLL) systems used by Grameen Telecom's competitors, Sheba and BRTA. While GSM towers can provide service within 5 kilometers, WLL towers provide coverage within 50 kilometers. Moreover, WLL provides better bandwidth for data transmission at a lower cost. Human Capacity. The development of a cadre of entrepreneurs, nurtured by Grameen Bank, has been key to the success of the village phone. After the Bank approves financing of a phone, Grameen Telecommunications buys a cellular phone subscription on behalf of the entrepreneur and provides the connection, necessary hardware, and training to operate it. Grameen Telecommunications also tracks trends in phone use and identifies operators who are having difficulty marketing or collecting payments for the service. The village phone network also yields important secondary benefits to the women who live in the villages that they serve. Because 95 percent of operators are female and the phones are in their homes, women who might otherwise have had very limited access to a phone feel comfortable using one. There is also some evidence that, because the phones are so important for whole villages, having female operators has helped to enhance the status of women in the communities where they work. Policy. Bangladesh's telecommunications regulatory regime is both antiquated and anticompetitive. One consequence has been BTTB's ability to maintain control over the switched network without expanding its capacity, even in the face of high demand. Scarcity forces Bangladeshis to pay large sums to BTTB officials in order to obtain phone service. BTTB's control of the network is likely to become an even more significant market disadvantage to Grameen Phone and other mobile operators when BTTB launches its own GSM mobile network this year. Enterprise. Grameen Telecom's village phone venture, as structured in Bangladesh, would not be feasible without access to the credit and bill collection services provided by Grameen Bank and the infrastructure and urban network provided by Grameen Phone. Village phones would be far less successful if Grameen Phone were not able to discount by 50 percent the rate charged to Grameen Telecommunications for a phone call, an underlying subsidy made possible by a transfer of profits from the more profitable urban part of the business to the rural sector. This is a significant advantage unavailable to rural-only competitors BRTA and Sheba. Content and Applications. Demand for telephone services in rural Bangladesh remains high despite relatively limited marketing and no overt content development by Grameen Telecommunications or Grameen Phone. In large measure, this is because the village phones offer tremendous economic value to the users, who would otherwise have to spend hours or days traveling to other towns to make a phone call. According to one study, the average consumer savings for a phone call from a village to Dhaka ranges from 2.6 percent to 9.8 percent of the user's mean monthly household income. Bangladesh is also a labor-exporting country with many rural people working overseas. As a result, one of the most important functions of the village phone is to facilitate remittances from relatives. Local business people and farmers also

use the phone to reduce costs, get better prices for their products, and plan shipments to reduce spoilage of perishable products. Key Lessons. Were it not for policy and infrastructure barriers, Grameen Telecom's village phones might already serve all of Bangladesh's 65,000 rural villages. The high revenues generated by the shared-access business model suggest the effectiveness of market drivers for such approaches. And as a development-centered ICT strategy, the village phone program promises broad benefits, including enhanced productivity and social welfare, and new sources of rural income. The Grameen Telecommunications business model relies on subsidies from urban cellular users, on financing and other support from Grameen Bank, and on GSM cellular technology that is less than optimal for sparsely-populated rural areas, fixed phone centers, and data transmission. The wireless local loop technologies used by Grameen Telecom's rural competitors or wireless multi-point distribution technologies—already being deployed by the TeNeT group and their partners in rural India—promise lower costs and higher data bandwidths. Under favorable policy environments, such rural networks, combined with shared access strategies that concentrate demand and generate efficient usage, may well enable profitable, market-driven approaches to providing connectivity and infrastructure in rural areas. Using mobile phones for medical treatment in rural areas of Rwanda Health workers in Rwanda are using mobile phones to communicate with rural care workers managing pregnant women in medical emergencies. The phones donated by Ericisson have special memories containing medical manuals, images and audio directions which can be sent to care workers and families. The project is based at the Mayange health centre which has a solar power charger for the 30 mobile phones which have been donated. This project is similar to the one I mentioned a while back called "Click Diagnostics" ClickDiagnostics, is a mobile solution to diagnosing common illnesses in rural areas where there are few or no doctors. The process uses images and basic symptoms for diagnosis and at the moment is used for skin and eye illnesses. As you can imagine ClickDiagnostics has the potential to make a huge impact on rural communities across the global south. Rwanda is fast becomes a technology hub for Africa with similar mobile phone projects for health, education and telecenters operating across the country. One such project is Tracnet It is a simple technology which has changed the way we deal with HIV in Rwanda," says Dr. Tom Mushi, at Kigali's Polyclinic of Hope. Previously, small clinics would often run out of medicines and other supplies. The time it then took to get in new supplies disrupted the centres' ability to fill prescriptions. "Now if the national drug supply can't send the drugs quickly enough to a centre, they can talk to a health centre nearby that has a high stock and have the need filled,". Mobile phones for agriculture Can mobile phones help the rice problem that the country is facing?Take the case of Imus Cavite, the target location of the De La Salle University’s study on ICT for development. Rich in agricultural land, Imus’s farmers however lack knowledge on the best practices about farming, making it difficult for them to improve their farm lands. The local government unit (LGU) of Imus, moreover, is inefficient in its agricultural services delivery. The case of Imus was discussed during the 2nd International Conference on Information and Communication Technology (ICT), held at the Renaissance Hotel, Makati on April 24-25, 2008.. Knowing that agriculture plays a huge role in our country, and that SMS technology has reached even the dominantly rural population of the country, the Swedish Program for Information and Communication Technology for Developing Countries (SPIDER) saw this as an opportunity to apply ICT in developing countries. Basically, SPIDER program begins by assessing the current information and

communication needs of the underserved and rural community. Through their mobile phones, residents from these communities can now access vital information that will help them solve the issues that hinder them from improving their livelihood. In the Philippines, the De La Salle University adopted the SPIDER program in their study on Imus’ Agriculture Network. Through the e-governance concepts of participatory democracy, good governance and the social networking, and with the help of Globe, as the project’s official industry partner, I-Agri, Imus’ agriculture network, was launched. It aims to provide readily accessible information across the agriculture value chain. Also, it will allow the local agriculture office of Imus to monitor government projects and make service deliveries more efficient. In addition, participants of this project can benefit by learning new innovative and transformative methods in farming, replicate and verify best farming practices from other countries. Issues Technical issues include: • Connectivity and battery life • Screen size and key size • Ability for authors to visualize mobile phones for delivery • Multiple standards, multiple screen sizes, multiple operating systems • Repurposing existing e-Learning materials for mobile platforms Social and educational issues include: • Accessibility and cost barriers for end users: Digital divide. • How to assess learning outside the classroom • How to support learning across many contexts • Developing an appropriate theory of learning for the mobile age • Design of technology to support a lifetime of learning • Tracking of results and proper use of this information • No restriction on learning timetable • Personal and private information and content Recommendations Local and state government need to integrate their telecom regulatory, tax and rural development policies, and do more to incentivise and support the roll-out of mobile services across the country; Improved lower-cost technologies are finally making it possible to erase the telecommunications divide that persists throughout rural developing areas. The mobile industry needs to understand the social impact of mobile connectivity in rural communities and to make it as accessible as possible to them. This does not only mean lower prices and costs of ownership: to really make a contribution to development they will also need to localise the mobile experience with relevant applications and services. Many of these will be innovated at a grass roots level and it is important for the mobile industry to work at this level to deliver real improvements; and Non-governmental organisations have an important role to play in working with state agencies to define the needs of rural communities and to develop new ways together to deliver a wide range of different social and welfare services. To do this they also need to work much more closely with the mobile industry to understand and test the technological possibilities Conclusion The current penetration level is 20 per cent. This is expected to double in the next three years. Mobility will move from voice and SMS to a host of value added service. All services that were delivered "from a physical building in the West and in urban India will now be delivered over the air. The Indian economy took 62 years to hit the $1 trilliog GDP-in MOV. The next trillion will take eight years. The next trillion will be about consumption and will be about SMB growth in India. Business mobility with influence the SME way of

thinking. More and more entertainment will be delivered through mobility. Indians will click through the Net more on mobiles and less on laptops. We will see more m-governance. Governments, departments will increasingly use the digitised route to superior governance. Mobility will considerably reduce the role of the middleman in commerce and the role of unscrupulous elements in disseminating wrong information. It will bring in a democratisation and efficiency of markets and information. This will create a huge pressure on elected representatives to be answerable. Mobility will give marketers the ability to target one consumer at a time, while also targeting milllons as a media vehicle. What are the steps to shape the future of mobility in India? All stakeholders including operators, content providers, media companies and OEMs should work in tandem through collaborations and partnerships to take India to the next leap in mobile telephony. They should work for evolving a transparent and more equitable revenue sharing industry-wide framework, while tightening the implementation of antipiracy laws. They should push for faster rollout/adoption of supporting infrastructure such as 3G and WiMax. Mobility has created huge value in every sphere that it has permeated. Its effects will only be exponential in the coming years. . References: 1.Grameen Foundation. (2005). Village Phone a Tool for Empowerment. USA. 2. Bhatnagar, S.(2000). Enhancing telecom options in rural India: Some options, India Telecom Conference. Stanford 3.Anderson James and N Biliou. (2007). Serving the world’s poor; innovation at the base of the economic pyramid. Journal of Business Strategy, 28 (2). 4. Anderson et.al., (2005). Smart Communications Inc Case A. ECCH Publication. 5.Bhalla, G S and Gurmail Singh.(2001). Indian Agriculture-Four Decades of Development. New Delhi: Sage www.neoncarrot.com www.dnindia.com www.infoworld.com www.govtech.net www.motorola.com www.cell-life.org www.infoworld.com www.govtech.net www.motorola.com www.cell-life.org