'There is plenty of scope for managed services, especially content management'

With the onset of 3G, how do you foresee the growth of the VAS market?
3G means bandwidth and the 3G network will provide greater data services capabilities in India. The onset of 3G also means greater portals. Now, users will be accessing various services on operators' portals. VAS in India will grow, and especially in our domain, which is mobile VAS (mVAS). The opportunity is right for mVAS providers to delve into this domain right now and start developing services.

What about the managed services market?
Networks and devices are changing increasingly on a daily basis in India. There is plenty of scope for managed services, especially content management services. IMImobile is a pioneer in this field. We have four types of managed services models-technology, business, content and application aggregation.

In the technology model, IMImobile owns intellectual property rights (IP`) for all its technology platforms and services. This allows us to assure service levels and technological innovation without depending on third party suppliers. IMImobile's business model delivers immediate access to the lucrative mobile content and mobile data services market. We have created a revenue share model, which aligns incentives for revenue growth whilst mitigating risks by minimizing upfront capital expenditure. Partnering with us helps customers focus more on subscriber acquisition, retention and brand management. We share the risks and rewards with our customers. IMImobile has partnered with over 400 content providers worldwide. Our specialist content teams evaluate and match each content item to its most appropriate and profitable outlets. We take care of all territorial and time limitations.

Can you tell us about the tie-up with MTN and how do you plan to leverage it?
MTN floated a tender for all equipment and IT vendors in South Africa, in which we eventually won. We will develop a unified technology platform in twenty-one emerging markets of Africa and the Middle East (Iran, Syria, Afghanistan and Yemen) in a hub-n-spoke model, which will be centrally monitored in Hyderabad. It gives MTN access to our 350 content providers worldwide. For us, it helps to reach out to MTN's 103.2 mn subscribers.

Can you please elaborate on the latest trends in the application market in India?
Today, application stores have gained much prominence. In its initial phases, operators made a lot of money, but it became difficult as networks became congested with too much traffic. Developers do not make money. I would suggest that developers do not concentrate on making client applications, which are very complicated in nature. However, developers should concentrate on building network applications that use the API of operators. This space will continue to develop in the future.

Madhura K Mukherjee
madhurak@cybermedia.co.in