Future Perfect

The performance of mobile affiliated industries in the future is very promising, and has a lot of potential. With more and more Indians getting access to mobile phones and connectivity, India is on the threshold of a mobile revolution. Unlike the West, which went through the Internet revolution, the most personalized and convenient medium for advertisers to reach out to the customers is through the mobile phone. But when all the conventional methods have almost reached a saturation point, how is this possible? Well, I believe that there are 4 major areas where we will see huge growth.

Mobile Internet: With the advancement in 3G and a cheaper cost of GPRS, people are using mobile Internet like never before. The user experience is also much better. The customer can use his/her mobile number to create a unique and individual presence on the Internet. Retailers, corporates, service providers, and advertisers can then brand their products, and also interact with the customers. The target audience would be more specific, by not intruding into the customer's space. The costs will come down too.

Advertisers: These areas would be definitely tapped by the advertisers. Mobile will soon surpass television in terms of reach, interactivity, and measurement. Thanks to technology, more people can watch their favorite television show or a cricket match right on their mobile. Advertising could then be customized. All this benefits the various players, including the operators leaving them with a huge opportunity. In order to service the loans that were taken for purchasing 3G licenses, operators would need an extra `200 crore per month. Advertising would no longer be spam. Instead, it would be on demand (Google search, location based search, classifieds search or embedded advertising. For example, the advertisement clip you see on TV while the bowler is getting back to his mark during a cricket match.) WiMax is another technology that can be adopted. The newspaper is subsidized by the advertisers (`2 from the reader and `10 from the advertiser), same with TV (200 plus channels for `200).

Mobile Commerce: Operators will also become financial institutions. A significant population of India does not have access to banks. The banking costs are high in India. If you deposit a cheque of `100 in an outstation branch, almost `50 goes towards servicing the transaction. Also, postpaid/credit systems do not work in India. This is why Internet commerce failed, as every user needs a credit card or bank account. This is one of the major reasons why mobile commerce will be successful. Day-to-day transactions can be automated with the help of technology by developing platforms that would facilitate these transactions. In this way, the user would actually initiate the interaction and operators could take up the role of banks by providing support for micro transactions. Businesses wouldn't have to worry about collecting huge amounts of money, as the sheer volume of mobile users making micro transactions would be huge. Operators could softwire us to every enterprise/brand/mobile device, and they can collect and hold funds.

Applications that facilitate this exchange and interaction, would be in high demand. This would spell good news for all the small and big players, who design and develop mobile applications.

Customized Applications: Customized applications that specifically serve the user's needs would be highly in demand. With decreasing costs, getting interactive through the phone would be much cheaper. Apps for entertainment (games, etc) will get most of the attention, but specific/customized apps will become a reality.

For example, a university can develop its own apps for its students. Customers could download the applications which they would commonly use, and a one-time download fee would be very feasible. For the application developers, charging less for every download would still give good returns due to the huge volume of users and the reach. It would be a win-win situation for both.

Support for micro transactions will transform the way businesses are set up, and the way they operate. If the new technologies do not help in building an ecosystem and fail to solve the day-to-day issues, then they would only remain as technology innovations.

Satyakalyan Yerramsetti
The author is CEO &
founder, SMSCountry
vadmail@cybermedia.co.in