AOL bullish on Indian mobile data software mkt

KOLKATA: US-based AOL's wireless divison, Tegic is bullish about Indian mobile data solution sector and will be launching several new services in the country mainly eyeing B and C class cities.

"We are very optimistic and bullish about Indian market mobile solutions for data transfer where mobile handsets are projected to grow very fast in the Indian market," AOL Mobile senior country manager Mridul Srivastava said here today at the launch of its Bengali supported T9 software.

"We are close to launching several new solutions like mobile search, mobile navigator and text output softwares," Srivastava said.

He said, during 2007, new mobile handset growth was pegged at 40 million and 54 million during 2008, according to a research firm. Total mobile penetration as on April 2006 was 97 million.

"The major growth in new users of mobile will come from B and C class towns. And, there we are optimistic because users in smaller towns prefer to send SMS in local languages," Srivastava said.

Currently, 12.3 billion SMSs are exchanged between mobiles in the country, but this number is projected to expand to 180 billion by 2010.

The company has T9 software in eight Indian languages like Hindi, Punjabi, Marathi, Tamil and Urdu and in other 55 global languages. The softwares are embedded in handsets.

The company launched the Bengali version here today. There is a 270 million Bengali-speaking population worldwide of which 80 million reside in India.