Nokia Asha 500, Asha 502 and Asha 503 launched in India

Nokia has expanded its Asha range of phones in India, and launched the Asha 500, Asha 502 and Asha 503 for the Indian market.

 

The Nokia Asha 502 is up for sale on the company’s website and is priced at Rs 5,739 and it comes with 500MB of free 2G data usage for Idea subscribers for three months.

 

The Nokia Asha 500 has been priced at Rs. 4,499 and will be available by the end of this month. The Asha 500 will come with free access to WhatsApp for Reliance subscribers for three months, after which the subscribers will be charged Rs. 17 per month for next nine months.

 

The Nokia Asha 503 has been priced at Rs. 6,799 and will be available in January 2014. The Nokia Asha 500, Asha 502 and Asha 503 phones are based on Nokia Asha Platform 1.1 and feature the updated Fastlane app, which was introduced in Asha 501, one-swipe access to camera app and one-touch sharing feature on WhatsApp.

 

The Finnish handset maker unveiled the Asha 500, Asha 502 and Asha 503 in October at Nokia World.

 

Nokia Asha 500 specifications

2.8-inch QVGA 320 x 240 pixels display
2MP rear camera
Dimensions: 100.3mm x 58.1mm x 12.8mm; Weight: 101.3 g
Dual SIM (optional), with 2G, WiFi, Bluetooth 3.0 with SLAM  and FM Radio
Nokia Asha software platform with Swipe UI
10 free Games downloadable from Nokia Store
64MB RAM; up to 32GB micro SD card support
1200 mAh battery with up to 14 hours of talk time and up to 22 days of standby
Colors: Bright Red, Yellow, White and Black

 

 

Nokia Asha 502 specifications

3.0-inch QVGA 320 x 240 pixels display
5MP rear camera with LED Flash
Dimensions: 99.55mm x 59.50mm x 11.10mm; Weight: 100 g
Dual SIM with dual standby
2G, WiFi 802.11 b/g/n , Bluetooth 3.0 with SLAM  and FM Radio
Nokia Asha software platform v1.1 with Swipe UI
64MB RAM; 64MB internal memory, up to 32GB micro SD card support
1110 mAh battery with up to 13.7 hours of talk time and up to 24 days of standby
Colors: Bright Red, Yellow, White and Black

 

Nokia Asha 503 specifications

3.0-inch QVGA 320 x 240 pixels display with curved Corning Gorilla Glass 2 protection
5MP rear camera with LED Flash
Dimensions: 102.6mm x 60.6mm x 12.7mm; Weight: 111.4  g
Dual SIM with dual standby (Optional)
3G, WiFi 802.11 b/g/n , Bluetooth 3.0 with SLAM  and FM Radio
Nokia Asha software platform with Swipe UI
10 free Games downloadable from Nokia Store
64MB RAM; up to 32GB micro SD card support
1110 mAh battery with up to 12 hours of talk time (2G) and up to 20 days of standby (dual SIM)
Colors: Bright Red, Yellow, White and Black

 

 

All the three new Asha devices follow the new design language, with the crystal frame wrapped around the device. On the software side, the phones run on the new Asha platform that introduces a new UI with easy swipe-able multiple homescreens with Fastlane feature among others. All the three devices also get free subscription to Nokia Music for a period of three months.

Lumia 520: Nokia's most affordable Windows 8 Phone available in India

Expanding its Lumia portfolio, Finnish handset maker Nokia on Wednesday launched two new mobile phones including a Windows 8 phone priced at Rs 10,500.

Lumia 520, Nokia's most affordable Windows Phone 8 smartphone, with the same digital camera lenses as on Lumia 920, will be available in the market within a week.

Lumia 720, which has a high-end camera, will be available by Mid-April. The company did not disclose the price of Lumia 720 but said it will be priced at around 249 euro, excluding taxes.

Nokia Lumia 520 is the most cheapest phone from the Nokia’s cheap phone plans in the Lumia series. Micromax is offering low and mid range phones and the most important factor is that the phones are appealing, have good look and comes in a affordable price. This effort from  Micromax has now been recognized to give tough competition to Karbonn mobiles, Samsung Mid range phones and also it is now leading the Nokia phones.

The Nokia Smartphone Lumia 520 comes with a 4-inch capacitive touchscreen with a resolution of 480 x 800 pixels. Nokia Lumia 520 is powered by 1 GHz Dual-core snapdragon S4 with a 512 MB RAM. 

The Nokia Lumia 520 avails a 8 Gb internal memory which can be expanded upto 64 GB and is mounted with a 5 MP rear camera with 4X digital zoom and is without flash.

List of 3G Mobile Phones available in India for less than Rs. 10,000

What is a 3G Service?

3G service is high-speed access to data and voice services, made possible by the use of a 3G network. A 3G network is a high-speed mobile broadband network, offering data speeds of at least 144 kilobits per second (Kbps).

For comparison, a dial-up Internet connection on a computer typically offers speeds of about 56 Kbps. If you've ever sat and waited for a Web page to download over a dial-up connection, you know how slow that is.

3G networks can offer speeds of 3.1 megabits per second (Mbps) or more; that's on par with speeds offered by cable modems. In day-to-day use, the actual speed of the 3G network will vary. Factors such as signal strength, your location, and network traffic all come into play.

So, we have compiled a list of all 3G enabled mobiles available in Indian market below Rs. 10,000 with their price in India as of February 2011.

3G mobiles in India below Rs. 5000

1. Samsung C5010 Squash : Rs. 3,500
2. Samsung C3212 Dual Sim Active : Rs. 3,600
3. Samsung C5130 : Rs. 3,900
4. INQ Mini 3G : Rs. 4,000
5. Nokia 2730 Classic : Rs. 4,100
6. Spice G6500 : Rs. 4,300
7. Nokia C2 01 : Rs. 4,500
8. LG GU285 : Rs. 4,600

3G mobiles in India below Rs. 10000

1. Sony Ericsson Cedar : Rs. 5,100
2. Samsung Star Nano 3G S3370 : Rs. 5,100
3. Samsung L700 : Rs. 5,300
4. Spice QT95 : Rs. 5,500
5. Sony Ericsson J105 Naite : Rs. 5,800
6. Nokia 7230 : Rs. 5,800
7. Samsung Metro 3G S5350 : Rs. 6,000
8. Micromax A60 : Rs. 6,600
9. LG T325 : Rs. 6,700
10. Sony Ericsson T700 : Rs. 6,900
11. LG GS500v Cookie Plus : Rs. 7,000
12. INQ Chat 3G : Rs. 7,000
13. Nokia 5230 : Rs. 7,100
14. Sony Ericsson Zylo : Rs. 7,300
15. Nokia C5 : Rs. 7,300
16. Nokia 3710 Fold : Rs. 7,400
17. HTC Smart : Rs. 7,500
18. Dell XCD28 : Rs. 7,800
19. Acer beTouch E110 : Rs. 7,900
20. Samsung S5620 Monte : Rs. 8,000
21. Samsung Omnia 652 B6520 : Rs. 8,000
22. Nokia E63 : Rs. 8,100
23. LG GW525 : Rs. 8,100
24. Sony Ericsson Elm : Rs. 8,100
25. LG GD580 Lollipop : Rs. 8,200
26. Sony Ericsson T715 : Rs. 8,400
27. Samsung Wave 575 S5753 : Rs. 8,600
28. Nokia 5235 : Rs. 8,700
29. Nokia C3 Touch and Type : Rs. 8,700
30. Micromax Modu T : Rs. 8,700
31. Samsung Galaxy 5 I5503 : Rs. 8,900
32. Spice Mi300 : Rs. 9,000
33. Nokia X5 01 : Rs. 9,100
34. Sony Ericsson W595 : Rs. 9,100
35. Samsung Galaxy Pop S5570 : Rs. 8,990
36. LG Chocolate BL20 : Rs. 9,200
37. Sony Ericsson C510 : Rs. 9,300
38. Nokia C5 03 : Rs. 9,400
39. Samsung Corby Pro B5310 : Rs. 9,400
40. Samsung Star 3G S5603 : Rs. 9,400
41. Samsung M5650 : Rs. 9,500
42. Spice G6565 : Rs. 10,000

Note : All the price are approximate and may vary with time and according to area.

Micromax Q7 Pocket Friendly Mobile Phone

With the growing competition in the mobile industry there are aspects that form the basis of competition. Be it looks, technology, comfort of usage or any other aspect, mobile today are put at neck to neck competition with each other in the Indian market.

As far as price is concerned there is no doubt to the fact that Micromax mobile stand at par or rather above many other handsets being offered in the market. This brand has managed to succeed in making its valuable position across the Indian mobile market. Just like the other mobile in the series Micromax Q7 has left a strong impact on users. Micromax mobile offers is provided with full touch, QWERTY keypad, dual sim, internet connectivity, good camera and other entertaining features.

This recent Micromax Q series mobile phone is launched just after looking at the success of the success of Micromax Q5.

Boasting much better and advanced features, this mobile has met the demand of youngsters. Adding an edge over advantage to the users, this Micromax Q7 is featured with Wi-Fi connectivity and can be used for its all attractive and impressive features. Known for its cost effective and pocket friendly mobile phone, this mobile phone is reasonably priced.

Micromax Q7 has got to flaunt just similar looks as the Blackberry and Nokia E series handsets. The best feature instilled is that it is dual sim mobiles that has eliminated the chaos of carrying two handsets at the same time for personal or professionals calling purposes. Further, it offers smooth and hassle free typing on its QWERTY keypad. Weighing just 100gms it can be easily carried along without making the pockets look heavy and uncomfortable. Clients can avail two most appreciating colors such as White Pearl Silver and Crystal Black Pearl.

The device carries out 2 mega pixel camera along with video recording and quality of camera is also great. Further it has 2.2 inches QVGA screen along with 262K color along with internal memory of 78 Mb that can be further expanded upto 4 GB. It has the capability to store 1000 phonebook entries and has got to feature certain entertaining attributes like audio/video player, Stereo FM radio, Gaming and MP3 /AAC /AAC Ringtones. This Micromax Q7 price is coupled with an affordable price tag as it offers the high tech features at comparatively lower price.

Nokia Dual Sim Mobile Phones Finally Launched in India

Dual sim means you can take the advantage of two connections in the same handset and also manage separately your personal as well as professional calls. Today numerous of domestic mobile brands have launched the many dual sim mobile phones in the sub - Rs 5, 000 category. So now the market leader Nokia is also focusing on the dual sim mobile phones to meet the current demand of the consumers. Recently we found the number of Nokia dual sim mobile phones in the Indian mobile market. The Nokia dual sim mobile price will surely suit to the pockets of many Indian consumers.

Fortunately, the telecom giant Nokia has launched its first dual sim mobile phones in India. They all from Nokia C series and this series are not at all new for us. We have already heard about the Nokia C3 and Nokia C5 mobile phones. These are the entry level handsets and satisfied the basic needs at affordable cost.

Now it introduces the two Nokia dual sim mobile phones in this series are Nokia C1 (C1-00) and Nokia C2 (C2-00). Both Nokia dual sim mobile phones come in the affordable range and offer the all basic features. But yes don’t expect the lavish features from these two Nokia dual sim mobile phones. They offer you the features like FM Radio, Color Screen, Flash Light and Send Messages. The Nokia dual sim mobile price comes under the bracket of Rs. 2000 to Rs 2800.

These Nokia dual sim mobile phones have the very similar features like Nokia C1 (C1-00) is accompanied with the FM radio, microSD card slot and a VGA resolution camera where as Nokia C2 (C2-00) has embedded with the similar above features but also has Bluetooth, Ovi Mail and Chat features. It is true that both Nokia dual sim mobile phones come under the very affordable price range.

But do you think? These mobile phones will prove to be success when other mobile manufactures have already launched the low end mobile phones in India. Well this is hard to say that because presently the Nokia is the strong name in the mobile industry so may be the people opt for the Nokia dual sim mobile phones instead of any other.

Nokia X2 Launched in India

Nokia has come over as a popular brand that is crowned to offer a line of stunning mobile phones to the worldwide users. Talking particularly about the music lovers, the new Nokia X2 has come over as the most stunning and appreciated Nokia mobile phone. It has become quite popular in the market and has given the option to enjoy a real fun time to rejoice to the mobile users. Nokia has come over as one of the biggest mobile manufacturing companies, where its latest introductions such as new music mobile phones can be claimed as the true delight of music lovers.

Among all the X series mobile phones considered as a new range of music phones, Nokia X2, X3, and X6 phones, X2 has gained a distinct place among the mobile lovers. It is considered as the newest member of family that is enwrapped as a wonderful device having a line of attractive features. All these aspects are necessary to be accomplished for all the entertainment needs. This Nokia mobile phone is a stylish handset and is thus, loaded with the latest features such as 2592×1944 resolution 5MP digital camera along with dedicated music keys, LED flash, 2.2 inches TFT display, and stereo speakers which are further supported by 3.5mm audio jack. This Nokia mobile phone is also shore up by 2G connectivity, featuring great storage capacity.

In order to make your music listening experience more enjoyable, the gadget is set equipped with instant access to apps from Ovi Store. Employing this feature, the music files can be managed via Ovi Player PC client or Windows Media Player 11. This mobile phone is an amazing device which has won the hearts of many mobile lovers. It is also considered as one of the best mobile phones introduced by Nokia.

Other highlights apart from Nokia X2 prices are the dual speakers, an FM stereo and Bluetooth connectivity for wireless music enjoyment. This mobile phone is a boost for the users who love social networking, X2 phones that offer direct access to Facebook directly from the homescreen.

This Nokia mobile phone is available in attractive pay monthly offers on all the major network services in UK. Almost of all these deals are accompanied by a number of additional benefits and free gifts including talk time, free texts, cash back offers, free laptop, LCD TV, reduced or free line rentals, or a free handset.

Nokia announced new additions to its Symbian^3 family

Nokia announced new additions to its Symbian^3 family of devices at the ongoing Nokia World in London. The announcement of the three new models takes the Symbian^3 device count to four.

Joining the Nokia N8, announced in April this year, are the Nokia E7 and two new entrants to the C series - C6-01 and C7.

The Nokia E7 is a business device boasts of a 4-inch touchscreen display and a slide out four-row keyboard. The E7 comes with an 8 megapixel camera and 16GB of on-board storage. The device is able to shoot and edit 720p video.

The business features of the E7 include support for Microsoft Exchange ActiveSync, Mail for Exchange, Microsoft Communicator Mobile and Microsoft Share Point Server.

With 18 days of standby time and up to 9 hours of talktime, the E7 is expected be available by the end of 2010 at a price of € 495 (Rs 29,500).

The new entrant to Nokia's C-family, the C7 has a 3.5-inch AMOLED and comes with an 8 megapixel camera along with 8GB of onboard storage. The C7 is expected to be priced at about € 335 (Rs 20,000).

The compact Nokia C6-01 also has an 8 megapixel camera. The device with a 3.2-inch AMOLED capacitive touchscreen and has the Nokia ClearBlack technology, also used in the E7, for improved outdoor visibility. The C6-01 is expected to be available for € 260 (Rs 15,500).

Nokia is in the middle of a major management revamp, with the departures of its chief executive and chairman announced last week and its top internal candidate for the CEO post resigning on Monday.

Nokia still controls around 40 percent of the global smartphone market volume, but has lost out to Apple and Research in Motion's Blackberry in the fatter-margin market for the most expensive cellphone models.

Mobile viruses are on the prowl

High-end devices become target of virus and malware writers.

Since malware authors are always out to make money and want the biggest bang for their buck, the number of attacks designed to exploit a certain device or platform is often directly related to the market share it commands.

With more than 600 million mobile subscribers, and mobile device sales in India forecast to reach 138.6 million in 2010 (according to Gartner), Indian mobile users have become the ideal target base for spammers, and virus and malware writers. According to Quick HealTechnologies, provider of mobile anti-virus solutions, the most targeted operating system (OS) of mobile malwares is Symbian (found in most of the Nokia, Sony Ericsson and Samsung handsets), with over 95 per cent malwares being reported on Symbian OS.

“Smartphones are going to pose a greater security risk to corporations as these phones have access to corporate networks in real time just in the same manner as laptops. This presents hackers and cyber criminals with a wider opportunity to use smartphones to compromise corporate network and access sensitive data,” says Kailash Katkar, MD and CEO, Quick Heal Technologies.

MALWARES’ NEW LABORATORY
* Over 95% malware attacks happen on mobile phones with Symbian OS
* Mobiles are vulnerable to virus attacks, just PCs
* These viruses slow down phones, start sending unsolicited SMSes/MMSes
* These steal valuable contact information from phone’s memory

The data loss a mobile virus can cause is as critical as a PC virus.

According to an internal study by Google, of about 600 million mobile phone users in India, around 25 million have paid for their data accounts while 55-65 million currently use the free data services provided by the wireless operator. The number of users with data services is estimated to reach around 100 million by the end of this year.

There have been more than 300 Apple iPhone vulnerabilities to date and around a dozen on the Google’s Android platform. Symantec maintains that while there hasn’t been a massive surge in mobile security threats, the situation can change in near future. As mobile apps (small programmes for devices), some of which are created by novice programmers using tools such as Google’s new App Inventor for Android, flood the market, security experts claim the security integrity of mobile devices could be affected.

In April, F-Secure Labs had reported about a malicious code inside a Windows mobile game that led to significant phone bills for users of Windows smartphones. Mikko Hypponen, chief research officer at F-Secure, notes: “A Russian malware author manipulated a game called 3D Anti-terrorist action, developed by a Beijing-based software company. The malware author trojanised the game and uploaded it to several Windows Mobile freeware download sites.” The malicious code, in turn, initiates phone calls to international premium-rate numbers, without any action or intention by the user. The case is similar to Cabir, a Symbian worm, which came in focus six years back, when it started spreading on handsets over Bluetooth, causing mobile phones to place long-distance calls.

SMSes, too, have been under attack. “SMS attacks or ‘Smishing’ is an attack that comes through an SMS onto a smartphone and is a mobile phone variant of a phishing attack. Much like a phishing attack, where an email is used to trick the user, in a smishing attack, it is a fraud SMS that is used as bait. The SMS comes with a link, clicking on which causes the Trojan to be installed on the mobile phone,” explains Shantanu Ghosh, VP, India product operations, Symantec.

Quick Heal, which claims to have over 30 per cent market share in the Indian anti-virus market, recently launched a new anti-virus solution called PC2MobileScan that could scan and clean mobile phones and smartphones.

At present, Quick Heal’s PC2MobileScan supports more than 550 mobile phone models, including Sony Ericsson, Nokia, Samsung, LG, Panasonic, Motorola, H-P, HTC and Siemens. Besides, security software makers like McAfee, F-Secure, Symantec, Trend Micro and Websense offer mobile security solutions that can quarantine viruses in real-time, besides on-demand scanning and auto-updating capabilities.

Venu Palakirti, country manager (India and Saarc), F-Secure underlines: “Even as virus writers increasingly target smartphones, too many people have smartphones with no security at all. People must understand that mobile security is just as critical as it is for desktops or laptops.”

Swissvoice launches 5 mobile phones in India

Swiss mobile phone firm Swissvoice launched five mobile phones in the price range of Rs 2,999 to Rs 5,999 thus making its grand entry to the Indian market.

“Initially, we will target the youth segment in the tier II and III cities in northern India. From next month, we will launch the handsets in southern states,” Swissvoice India Director Dollar Gulati said.

The European company launched the handset through its Indian subsidiary Swissvoice India. The Swiss company aims to sell around 30,000 handsets every month in the hugely crowded Indian handset market. Besides the internationla giants like Nokia, Motorola, Sony Ericsson, Samsung and LG, in the recent past Indian market has seen local competitors in Spice, Micromax, Lemon, Lava, Karbonn and Zen mobile phones.
and manufactures its products in China with R&D being conducted in Hong Kong, the company said.

Time for mobile users to ring in recycling

Do you plan to discard your mobile phone or exchange it for a new one? Then consider this: Old mobile phones constitute 1,700 tonnes of the 50,000 tonnes of e-waste generated in India each year and, according to a UN report released early this year, e-waste from mobile phones is set to rise 18 times by 2020.

E-waste, or electronic waste, implies discarded computers, mobiles, refrigerators or any other electronic appliance at the end of its life. With growing consumerism, discarding e-waste has become a big challenge in the country.

This has spawned a relatively new sector: Organised recycling. As of now, 16 players have sprung into action by re-cycling mobile phones, which also contain precious metals like gold, silver and platinum as well as other metals like copper. Mobile phone and PC makers gobble up three per cent of the world’s entire gold and silver supply each year, not to mention 13 per cent of palladium, 15 per cent of cobalt, and plenty of copper, steel, nickel and aluminum.

Faisal Faraz, marketing manager for e-waste recycling company Greenscape, says, “Almost 90 per cent of e-waste is being recycled by the unorganized sector, which includes small scale garbage collectors. The process they use for extracting precious metals is not only harmful, but also results in the loss of almost 75 per cent of the precious metals.” He reasons that a licensed re-cycler can extract metal waste in an eco-friendly way.

While all parts of a gadget are re-cycled locally, printed circuit boards (PCBs) of mobile phones are exported abroad to smelting companies for metal extraction. Last year alone, Greenscape exported 100 tonnes of PCBs from e-waste (1.3 tonnes from mobile phones) to smelting companies, like Umicore, in Belgium.

Besides precious metals, an average mobile phone contains poisonous substances like lead and mercury, which can pose serious environmental and health hazards if not disposed properly.

The Indian Cellular Association (ICA), which represents the mobile industry, is said to be working on e-waste guidelines. Pankaj Mahendroo, president, ICA, says, “Except for a few vendors there is no massive recycling initiative yet.”

This is the situation in a country where annual mobile sales are forecasted to reach 138.6 million in 2010 — an increase of 18.5 per cent over last year’s sales of 117 million units, according to Gartner data. “Cellular phone penetration in India stood at 45 per cent in 2009 and, now, the market is entering a second growth phase, with replacement sales increasing from 45 per cent in 2009 to 50 per cent of total sales in 2010,” informs Anshul Gupta, principal research analyst at Gartner.

Major handset makers may have announced a take-back policy that collect old handsets and give them to authorised re-cyclers, but the exercise is clearly lacking momentum as most users are still unaware of such schemes.

According to a Nokia study, awareness in India about recycling was the lowest among all countries surveyed at 17 per cent and 84 per cent of Indians didn’t think about recycling their unwanted phones.

A small beginning was made by Nokia with ‘Planet Ke Rakhwaale’ — a take-back and recycling campaign launched early this year. Under the programme, Nokia encourages consumers to drop their unused mobiles and chargers, irrespective of the brand, into 1,350 recycling bins placed at Nokia Care Centres. As of April, Nokia says it has collected more than 16 tonnes — or more than 500,000 phones and accessories.

Samsung, too, informs that it has an on-going recycling initiative across 216 centres. “We have tied up with a government-authorised recycling agency for recycling old mobiles. The response to this initiative has been encouraging and we plan to shortly extend this take-back programme to our consumer electronics products as well,” says Ranjit Yadav, director, Mobile & IT, Samsung India, without detailing how many mobile phones the company has recycled so far.

Sony Ericsson, while claiming it has a take-back policy for old handsets, remained uncommunicative on details.

Dual-SIM Mobile Phones Gaining Popularity in India

Demand for mobile phones that can accept two SIM (subscriber identity module) cards has picked up strongly in India, but Nokia, the dominant handset vendor in India, is late to the market.

Dual SIM phones currently account roughly for close to about 15 percent of mobile phones sales in the country, and the market is growing fast, said Anshul Gupta, principal research analyst at Gartner.

Nokia plans to launch its first dual-SIM phone, the Nokia C2, in India in the next few months.

Competitor Samsung said its dual-SIM phones, introduced in the second quarter of last year, will account for 12 to 15 percent of mobile phones sold by the company this year. That's up from about 8 percent of unit sales last year, said Ruchika Batra, a spokeswoman. The company is launching more dual-SIM models this year, she added.

The market is mainly driven by users who want to switch between carriers to take advantage of the best deals, said Gupta. Business and professional users may also use these phones to have a separate mobile number for personal and official calls, he added.

A large number of buyers of Samsung's dual SIM phones use the two SIMs on the phone to switch between network providers if coverage gets patchy, or when they are traveling between cities, Batra said.

The market for dual SIM mobile phones is dominated currently by locally branded phones, and phones from Chinese vendors selling into India, according to Gupta.

Such vendors are providing increasing competition for big-name players like Nokia, which had a 54.1 percent share of the India's 101.54 million-unit mobile phone market in 2009, according to research firm IDC India. The company's share is bound to go down as more vendors enter the Indian market, IDC India said in April.

Indian and Chinese vendors are making inroads at the low end of the Indian mobile phone market by offering a combination of features such as dual SIM, powerful speakerphones and a battery life of up to 30 days, Gupta said. These vendors have stripped some features, like the camera and Wi-Fi, from mobile phones to lower costs, and instead focused on features like long battery life which are so critical in rural markets, he added.

India had 617.5 million [m] mobile subscribers at the end of May, according to data from the Telecom Regulatory Authority of India.

Dell to Launch Mobile Phones in India

Dell will very soon be launching their mobile products in India. Dell has just launched a major advertising campaign in a lot of local newspapers for their mobile phones.

There are reports that Dell is working on a Windows Phone 7 based device called the Dell Lightning but we don’t know if this is real, so expect this in the Indian launch.

Everyone knows that the mobile market in India is very large and they are very sensitive about the price. Thus, it will be hard for Dell to compete with Nokia and Blackberry, unless they have a a nice range of mobile products.

Top Five Mostly Used Mobile Phones in India

Mobile phones are becoming part of a person's life. Back in late 90's, mobile phone was a luxury and only "Rich" people could afford it but now time has changed and even the tea stall owner or rickshaw driver can afford a mobile phone. I think to have a mobile phone in India is now a necessity.

India is pumping millions of mobile subscribers every month and now I think India has more mobile subscribers than landlines. So what mobile phones are popular in India?

Recently, Opera released a report for Opera Mini revealing the top 10 sites accessed from cell phones and also, the top 10 handsets used for accessing the sites. Here’s the list of the top 5 mobile phones used in India as per Opera Mini’s report for June 2008 –

• Nokia N70
• Nokia N73
• Nokia 6233
• Nokia 6600
• Nokia 3110c
  

As you can see, only Nokia handsets are in the top 5 and this shows the dominance of Nokia in Indian market. That being said, these five phones are equipped with a number of basic features. These five phones are also available at reasonable prices and maybe this is the reason why they are so popular among Indian users.

Mobile Phones With Free Gifts offers you More Than your Expectation

A mobile phone or a cell phone is a long range, portable electronic device that is used for mobile communication. A cell phone uses a network of specialised base stations known as cell sites. Current mobile phones come equipped with a number of useful applications like Instant Messaging, Internet Access, Camera and Hands Free. The third generation (3G) mobile phones were first commercially launched in Japan in 1990. Due to advances in technology, cell phones have become increasingly compact over a period of time.

Currently, the Nokia Corp. is the largest manufacturer of mobile phones in the world. The company has a current global mobile phone market share of approximately 36 percent. Africa has the largest growth rate of cell phone subscribers in the world. Over 6 million cell phones are sold in India in a month alone. The country expects to reach up to 500 million subscribers by the end of 2010. These days, the cell phones can also be custom decorated to reflect the owner’s personality.

Gone are the days when only high profile business people and executives could afford to own a mobile phones. These days, mobile phones have become very common. Be it a student, home maker or an executive, everyone keeps a cell phone with him or her these days. Mobile phones industry is a multi billion dollar industry today. The success of many businesses depend upon the efficient utilisation of mobile phone services. In fact, there is a large number of people who cannot spend a single day without using a mobile phone.

Mobile phones keep one in touch with her or his near and dear ones at all times. These devices come quite handy in an emergency situation. One can always inform about his emergency to the police, family members or his friends with the help of a cell phone. Most high end mobile phones these days come equipped with a video camera and a Global Positioning System (GPS) receiver. A GPS receiver helps in locating the exact position of the mobile phone user.

Retailers across the UK are offering attractive free gifts with branded mobile phones to the consumers to increase their usage. These free gifts could include goodies like free talk time, free text messages and subsidised call rates. Some of them will also give consumers costly gifts like a Nintendo Wii or Sony PlayStation gaming console when one purchases a high end mobile phone from them. Many retailers also give cash back offers on some selected handsets. Still others will insure the user’s handset for free for a limited period of time. Some may even offer a free handset as a gift to the users.

The free gifts with mobile phones are a relatively new trend. The manufactures offer free gifts to the users with cell phones to increase the sale of their devices. UK based mobile network service providers like Orange, Virgin and Vodafone have come up with many innovative mobile phone deals. Such deals help these network service providers to increase their subscription base.

Free gifts with mobile phones have become so popular that people always look for them before purchasing a new handset. World’s leading manufacturers of mobile phones like Nokia, Samsung and Sony Ericsson have come up with many new models of cell phones in past few years. Some of the highly capable handsets launched by these manufacturers during past few years include Sony Ericssson W850i, Nokia 8800 Sapphire Arte and Samsung U100. Retailers in the UK are offering free gifts like Apple iPod, laptops and XBox 360 Elite gaming console with these handsets.

One may also opt to purchase a Contract Mobile phone or a Pay As You Go Mobile phone. These handsets come with attractive mobile phone deals. One may get a lot of incentives under these deals. One may also search the internet to know more about the free gifts offered by various online retailers in the UK. 12 months free line rental is the latest deal that is gaining popularity among the people in the UK. In fact, a large number of people these days purchase only that handset which is offered with some free gift.

Dell Bets on Smartphone Sales in India

Better late than never. That seems to be Dell’s mantra as it seeks to launch its first smartphone in India – the world’s fastest growing and second-largest mobile phone market – to take on the combined Hewlett-Packard-Palm threat it now faces.

“We will launch a smartphone in India later this year,” Steve Felice, president of Dell’s consumer, small and medium business division, said in a post-earnings conference call with Asian journalists Friday.

Dell will also bring more smartphone models to China in addition to the one launched earlier this year, he added.

The move can’t come too soon.

Rival Hewlett-Packard, which leads Dell in overall PC market share globally as well as in India, agreed to buy Palm Inc. in April this year for about $1.2 billion. H-P is expected to use the acquisition to add smartphone market share to its market leadership of worldwide and Indian PC sales.

In India, sales of mobile phones far outnumber personal computers. For every personal computer sold in India, 80 new mobile phones were sold in the calendar year of 2009, according to statistics by research firm IDC India.

Commercial third-generation bandwidth services are expected to roll out in September, which is likely to boost consumption of data services on smartphones.

Finnish handset maker Nokia had the largest share of 54.1% in terms of units sold in India during calendar year 2009 followed by Korean firms Samsung with a 9.7% share and LG with a 6.4% share, a note by IDC India said.

Though no separate numbers on smartphone sales in India were immediately available, the entry of cheap Indian-branded and Chinese-made copies of Nokia, Blackberry and iPhone smartphones may spoil the party for Dell, H-P and other smartphone makers including Apple.

The mobile phone market has got more crowded and fragmented, said IDC India.

“The rise of ‘copycat’ models that have looks and aesthetics resembling those of high-end smartphones which are often available for as little as one-tenth of the average sales value of a smartphone have led to this,” the research firm added.

Also, price-conscious consumers have forced intensely competitive operators to charge a pittance for voice calls, so it is still difficult to sell unlimited data plans, none of which cost less than $20 dollars a month.

Despite this, the need of the average Indian to access information and use services like learning English or booking train tickets on mobile phones should help Dell in its smartphone venture eventually.

3G: Handset companies line up new launches, cut prices

Mobile phone manufacturers have seized the opportunity to sell 3G phones, even before private telecom operators are awarded the airwaves, by lining up new launches and cutting handset prices to just over Rs 4,000.

In doing so, cellphone makers are attempting to lure buyers of high-end GPRS handsets, which operate on the 2G spectrum. Phones operating on the 3G airwaves, which are up for auction, offer faster data downloads and high-quality video streaming.

“Even before 3G auctions are complete, we have seen significant demand for handsets,” says Jeff Taylor, co-founder, INQ Mobiles.

Nearly 20% of India’s 550 million cellphone subscribers possess high-end GPRS handsets, which are priced between Rs 2,500 and Rs 35,000.

Nokia is offering a 3G phone (model: 2730) from Rs 4,119 onwards, while Sony Ericsson’s phone begins at the Rs 6,000 price-point. At the higher end, Blackberry’s 3G model is priced upwards of Rs 17,000 while Apple’s iPhone 3G is priced at over Rs 30,000.

Mobile phone manufacturers are expecting the spectrum auctions to shake up the Rs 35,000-crore market, which operates on wafer-thin margins of 1-2%.

Value-added service players are also eyeing gains from the launch of TV serials or comedy clips on mobiles. Second-largest player Samsung has one of the largest cellphone line-ups with 13 models and plans to launch up to seven more in the next six months.

“India is a technology-adaptive market, and thus the new launches,” says Ranjeet Yadav, head of Samsung’s IT division.

Delhi, Bangalore and Mumbai are the largest markets for high-end phones. The Capital alone sees 20% of sales for phones costing over Rs 10,000 in India. “Pricing of handsets will not be a problem as most handsets are already quite affordable,” says Sudhin Mathur, head of LG’s India mobile division. LG has about five 3G handsets and plans to introduce up to 10.

Surfing, emailing and downloading of applications will be the most sought-after features on the new handsets, says Mr Taylor of INQ Mobile, which entered the Indian market just two months ago with Aircel.

The company has two handsets in the Indian market, both of which are 3G-enabled. It is planning to come out with altogether five handsets in the mid-market price segment of below Rs 8,000, he says.

Nokia launches C3, C6, E5 mobile phones

Mobile phone giant Nokia announced the launch of three new handsets - Nokia C3, Nokia C6 and Nokia E5. The Nokia C3 and Nokia C6 are social messaging phones while the Nokia E5 is the business messaging phone.


Nokia Corp. launched three less-expensive smart phones, including its first model expected to sell for under euro100 ($135) — in a strong move to grab new customers in emerging markets.


The world's largest mobile phone maker said it wants "to put better messaging and social networking tools in the hands of more people around the world at affordable prices."


The new Nokia C3, Nokia E5 and Nokia C6 handsets have full QWERTY keyboards, enable instant messaging and give access to e-mails. Their expected selling prices respectively are euro90, euro180 and euro220 before taxes and subsidies.


The handsets will be available during the second and third quarters of this year.


"Nokia's strategic focus is clearly on emerging markets now and taking higher feature devices to the masses and these three devices do that quite nicely," said Neil Mawston, analyst at Strategy Analytics in London.


Finland-based Nokia, which is increasingly turning to providing applications and services for handset users, said in December it will focus on the smart phone sector, including providing cheaper handsets in emerging markets.


Despite strong competition from Blackberry and iPhone, Nokia's market share in smart phones grew from 35 percent to 40 percent in the last quarter of 2009.


The cheapest of the new models, the C3, with an estimated price tag of euro90, includes a two megapixel camera, a 2.4 inch screen and will include access to Nokia's Ovi Mail and Ovi Chat that allow first-time users to set up e-mail and chat accounts straight from the device without the need for a computer.


It has WiFi connectivity and support for up to an 8GB memory card, allowing users to update their status and share pictures on social networks such as Facebook and Twitter.


"The C3 stands out the most at a very competitive price with a very effective feature set ... that goes squarely after the lower-tier mass market in India, Africa, China," Mawston said. "It's going to be one of their star devices over the next two quarters."


The Nokia C6, with an estimated price of euro220, has a 3.2-inch touch screen with full slide-out keyboard and a five megapixel camera featuring autofocus and flash.


The E5, expected to sell for some euro180, is targeted at corporate customers with numerous productivity applications available in Nokia's Ovi Store. It has direct access to over 90 percent of the world's corporate e-mails through Mail for Exchange and IBM Lotus Notes Traveler.


Nokia's share price was virtually unchanged at euro11.18 ($15.19) in early afternoon trading in Helsinki.

Mobile apps Revolution

The mobile apps revolution is here. Market research firm Gartner estimates that this year alone, mobile users across the globe will pay more than $6.2 billion to buy 'mobile applications' -- games, social networking tools, productivity and entertainment-based mini programmes for mobile phones.

And this despite the fact that 80 per cent of these will be free downloads anyway this year.

Apps have become the business with the fastest turnaround time in the software industry. In just one month an application can be developed and marketed to a global community of enthusiastic downloaders.

Sample this. In January this year, 3 billion apps were downloaded from the Apple app store, which has more than 100,000 titles in categories such as games, business, news, sports and health.

BlackBerry App World has around 4,000 titles and Google's Android Market, 20,000.

Little wonder, then, that mobile app developers, a non-existent breed just five years ago, are crawling out of the woodwork. Students, teachers, even doctors have jumped into the fray, competing with career software professionals.

In India, the world's second biggest mobile phone market of more than 500 million consumers and a large community of software programmers, there is fierce competition among developers to deliver apps that run on different handsets and technology platforms.

What's driving their business are online app stores on the Apple, Nokia, Samsung and Sony Ericsson websites, and on Facebook and Orkut, where developers can sell directly to consumers. Of course, they must pay a yearly fee and 30 per cent of their revenues to the service platform.

But this is a better scenario -- there was a time when app developers earned a paltry 10-15 per cent as royalty from mobile service providers.

Nokia Launches 2730c Most Affordable 3G Mobile Phone In India

Nokia the leading mobile phone makers today announced the launch of most affordable 3G handset, Nokia 2730 classic in India. The Stylish, sleek and compact Nokia 2730 classic is one of the most affordable 3G enable mobile phone priced at Rs 4,499.

The Nokia 2730 classic supports 3G for faster search and browsing and an integrated Opera mini browser. The Nokia 2730 classic is Nokia Life Tools compatible.Key features of the device include a 2? QVGA active display, 2 megapixel camera, MP3 player, 3.5 mm AV connector, USB 2.0, Bluetooth 2.0 +EDR, Bluetooth stereo, Flash Lite 3.0 and MIDP Java 2.1 with additional Java APIs.



The Handset provides an ultimate Internet experience and is competitively equipped with Nokia’s range of emerging market services such as Ovi Mail, Nokia Messaging, Nokia Life Tools, and browsing, making it easy for consumers to share and manage life.The handset is available in black and dark magenta colors.

Nokia To Launch Rs. 500 Handset Under Life Tools Program

As you all know that Nokia has launched its Nokia Life Tools program last year to tap the potential in India's rural market. The program aims towards connecting farmers with each other and also with their businesses in a better way. As a next step, Nokia will now be offering cheap handsets under its Life Tools program. These handsets will cost around 1,000 INR and farmers can easily afford them. Nokia is also planning to launch a 500 INR handset.

Nokia sells handsets in Indian rural markets through micro finance and such cheap handsets will help Nokia in penetrating the market in a better way. If you see today's mobile handset market in India, Nokia is one of the few branded companies that offers handset so cheap.

Nokia, though a big and strong player, is facing competition from its counterparts like Samsung and LG on one end and then there are Chinese cheap handsets and other India based OEMs like Micromax, Karbon who are slowly coming into the market. Their handsets offer a lot of features at a very low price.

With Life Tools, Nokia has already started tapping the rural treausre that India has and now the cheap handsets might just to the trick for Nokia. One thing is for sure, Nokia does know that India's rural market has potential as well as huge money and like Nokia always says, they love ompetition but they always aim for the biggers piece of the pie.