Now Mobile TV for BSNL users, but only in selected regions

http://www.newstrackindia.com/newsdetails/1158

NI Wire

New Delhi

Mon, 15 Oct 2007:  Newstrack India

Oct 15: The government-owned telecom company Bharat Sanchar Nigam Ltd (BSNL) has started its ‘TV in mobile handset’ service. Now users can easily tch some selected television channels on their mobile handsets.

However, at this point of time the service is limited to some regions of north and eastern India. But soon the company is planning to extend this to all parts of India by developing the required infrastructure and also making deal with television channels and mobile device manufacturers.

Initially the service will be available free of cost for 30 days but subsequently with a monthly rental.

Working in collaboration with Apalya Technologies Pvt. Ltd BSNL is planning to increase its number of users especially users of rural areas where it is somehow difficult to reach with cable TV. Apalya Technologies is a Hyderabad based company providing solution for TV channel content provider to mobile platforms.

Now with this service BSNL GSM users can watch as many as 12 channels on their handset that supports this technology (presently only some Nokia handsets do offer this facility). Channels include Aajtak, Times Now, Zoom, ETV, TV9, NDTV, CNBC and some others. The number of channels will be increased to 32 within the next couple of months as per the company source.

The company is also holding talks with other mobile device manufacturers like Sony Ericsson and Motorola to come up with technology in handsets that can support mobile video platform.

As Indian mobile phone market is growing speedily, users demand more value added services with new developing high bandwidth 3G technology that can catch not only the metro market but also people living in rural and semi urban areas.

With the increasing mobile phone market, there is also huge demand for mobile content and mobile video. And with the BSNL which has the largest reach to the rural and semi urban regions of India, this service may pick up more users by generating a mass market.