By the end of Q4 we may enter the tablet market

AirTyme recently launched 2 feature phones namely Flaunt and Torrid. How are these products different?

Flaunt is essentially a 3G enabled HSPA phone. AirTyme believes in providing the best technology to its customers without trading functionality, style or value, and Flaunt is an epitome for that. It's a sharp product and we have co-branded it and launched it in India for the first time. Flaunt delivers on this promise with its loaded feature-set and its conversation-stopping swivel design. Flaunt let users seamlessly connect to wireless 3G networks that deliver information faster than ever. Users can exchange instant messages through Yahoo!, Gtalk, MSN and AOL, browse the internet with the Opera Mini browser, and send multimedia messages.

Torrid, again a feature phone and a UTStarcom product, was co-branded by us. Torrid is priced competitively to ensure that it is accessible to larger audiences. Torrid's support for high-speed 3G networks (where coverage is available) ensures reliable and hassle-free internet surfing as pages load within seconds.

We plan to launch these handsets in 6 major cities and 4 tier-2 cities by 15th of this month. We have an aggressive marketing plan for the handsets. We are focussing on middle-income earning consumer market.

What has been AirTyme Communications domain of focus for the Indian market?

Since September, we entered the Indian market basically with 2 major verticals in mind. We wanted to do operator centric business, working closely with operators like MTS. We supply handsets to the operators according to their preference and described features from our units based in Shenzen, China, Taiwan, and US.

Second focus has been to build AirTyme as a brand and bring as many brands as possible under the AirTyme umbrella. Direct open market business is what our second most important focus is and that's the reason we entered this domain.

Where do you see yourself in the next few years as a handset player and how do you plan to counter almost 200 handset players already thriving for survival in this market in India?

We cannot be part of the same league as of other handset players. We have many projects lined up in the pipeline to strengthen our portfolio. We want to go slow with our launches unlike other players who are entering the market with 10-12 handsets of inferior quality. Our purpose is to give quality experience to our customers. We are in no hurry, so we will wait for Torrid and Flaunt, to mark their presence and we will build our portfolio slowly and steadily. By the end of Q4, we may enter the tablet market and will be launching 5-6 high-end phones as well. We want to open an Indian avenue to CDMA products-bundled packaged handsets from low range to high. Our products will be a mix of GSM and CDMA.

Akanksha Singh
akankshas@cybermedia.co.in