The Times of India
Billion SMSes for billion Indians Mini Joseph Tejaswi [ 30 Dec, 2006 0108hrs IST TIMES NEWS NETWORK ]
BANGALORE: Come December 31 evening and 150 million mobile phones in India will send out over a billion New Year SMS greetings. That will be equivalent to almost every citizen in the country receiving an SMS on that day.
Paper greetings are passe. "Today, everyone prefers personalised, sharply addressed, warm, fresh, touchy and convenient communication, thereby making SMS the most favoured and cost-effective medium of communication," says Samuel Selvakumar, director (operation-south) Hutch.
Over 936 billion SMSes were sent out worldwide during calendar 2005, and the major chunk of it was from India and China, said a recent Gartner report. SMS volumes are expected to touch 2.3 trillion by 2010, of which Asia Pacific alone would have a share of 1.8 trillion, predicts Gartner. In India, the SMS segment has been growing at 200% year-on-year.
Even during calendar 2003, when the cellular phone population was barely 40 million, the country had SMS volumes of 7.39 billion, adds the Gartner report.
"I stopped sending paper greetings three years ago. I send almost 100 SMSes on New Year," says Kokilan Sen, a techie in Bangalore.
Manmohan Bhatnagar, operations manager, Spice Communications said, "People today prefer SMS greetings to paper greetings." "New Year is the time when all of us simultaneously try to connect with our friends, associates and families. This year,we expect huge increase in SMS traffic," says Deepak Mehrotra CEO (mobile services) Bharti Airtel Ltd. To cater to this, telecom service providers have augmented their network and have taken steps to avoid traffic choke.
"They have been consciously investing in expanding the SMS network and capacity by providing dedicated signalling channels," says Arun Tanksali, chief technology officer, Jatayu Software, a mobile technology firm.
-- My humanity is in feeling we are all voices of the same poverty. - Jorge Louis Borges