The competition in telecom industry was once as feeble as the sloth. But as Reliance’s Jio entered into this sector, it simply whitewashed all other networks by offering the unlimited Internet and phone calls at no price, those were the days when people were worried about recharging their mobiles for 3G and 4G data.
JIO’s grand entry during the period of the Internet drought and data hungry times is quite extraordinary. Within no time, this mobile network has mastered Indian market, beating the major rivals like Airtel, Vodafone, Tata Docomo, Idea and all others at a single bait.
It is well transparent that the rival networks even descended the priced thrones coming down to offering the Internet and phone calls as cheap as possible. Though there were many moments when it is believed that somehow the networking big shots like BSNL, Airtel, and Vodafone might compete with JIO by offering data at further cheap prices, but it has never been possible till now.
Anyhow, here’s a major Canadian techie ‘Datawind’, well known for its cheapest data plans at the hairpin prices, and according to the sources, Datawind might make an entry into Indian market. The appeal for its entry is in the process and it only needs a clap from Indian authorities to reap into Indian telecom sector.
The astonishing thing about Datawind is that it is going to provide the Internet to its customers at Rs 20 per month.
This major firm has plans to invest Rs 100 crore in telecom services business in the first six months of getting a license and offer data services at Rs 200 per year. Datawind is well known for making low-cost tablets and smartphones has applied for a pan-India virtual network operator (VNO) license, to set up its centers in India.
However, the license will allow it to offer mobile telephony and data services but only in partnership with existing native telecom operators.
Datawind President and CEO Suneet Singh Tuli said on the sidelines of the launch of first Punjabi education tablet, “We are hoping that we should get the license in a month or so. Datawind will invest Rs 100 in the first six months to launch the business focussing on data services.”
Tuli then added that the company plans to offer data plans that will not cost Rs 20 per month or lesser.
“JIO’s Rs 300 plan is affordable for those who have been spending Rs 1,000-1,500 per month. This would be only top 300 million people. Rest of the people spend around Rs 90 a month and for them it is not that cheap” Tuli said in a statement.
“We will look at data plans around Rs 20 per month or lesser. One year of data service should not be more than Rs 200,” he concluded.
When taken into account, Tuli’s statistics on the data users is quite accurate, JIO might have been ruling the Internet world since its debut in September, but the way it is playing the game is quite limited to certain class of people and Datawind is aiming to fill that gaps somehow.