The
world's cheapest tablet, Aakash, costing about Rs 3,000, has received
about 3 lakh pre-launch bookings for its commercial version that goes on
sale later next month.
A subsidised model of this tablet, made
by UK-based Datawind, is already being distributed free in schools and
colleges. Aakash's retail bookings exceed India's estimated 250,000
tablet PC market, dominated by Apple,
Samsung and Reliance.
"The bookings for
Aakash have been done without any money received in advance. We have identified an operator for a data plan at Rs 99 a month," said
Datawind
CEO Suneet Singh Tuli, who claimed the data streaming technology
offered by his company could make internet access costs virtually free.
"We hope to make internet free on our devices with that technology."
Tuli is experimenting with a technology that can stream a 700MB file
compressed into a 25MB on a tablet. Aircel could be the likely operator,
said executives of the two companies, requesting anonymity.
Datawind has supplied about 10,000 tablets to the government's National
Mission for Education at a price of Rs 2,250. The devices are being used
by students from colleges such as the IITs, RECs, BITS Pilani, Teri
University and others.
Aakash, in its next version, will be
upgraded with a capacitive touch screen and a processor with double the
speed. Datawind plans to supply an attachableRs 400 keyboard, turning
the device into PC-lookalike at Rs 3,400.
The government is
also considering a proposal to procure the next lot, called Aakash 2,
with a faster 700 MHz processor, albeit at the same price. Tuli says
there have been invitations from other nations for their digital
inclusion programs, seeing India's success.
"The governments of Mexico,
Sri Lanka,
Egypt,
Thailand, Brazil,
Bangladesh
have requested us to participate in programs similar to India. None,
though have come out with tenders for supply of low cost devices as of
now," Tuli said. KPMG's telecom head Jaideep Ghosh, however, says that
the low-cost tablet success might not be as specatcular as that of the
mobile handsets.
"About 185 million new handsets being sold in
India this year. But the number of tablets to be sold in a year would be
in the range of 250,000 to 500,000 units." The low price is attractive
only for students and the youth, who are aspiring to buy new products,
he said.
Cheapest download The tablet market is expected to see a price war as
Reliance Industries and Bharti Group are also gearing up to offer cheaper data plans on tablets. RIL may
slash
the cost of data download to as low as Rs 10 per GB on its upcoming Rs
6,000 tablet. Data downloads cost around Rs 100 per GB for most
operators now.
Delhi-based Bharti Group's Beetel is also
gearing up. "We were the first to introduce a tablet (Magiq) at Rs
9,999, this year. From January we will be going fullsteam and launch a
third version of the tablet," says Vinod Sawhny, chief executive of
Beetel Teletech. Samsung India is also launching a third model of the
Galaxy Tab next month.
As per
KPMG, Samsung has about 80% share of the market, followed by
Apple
with 5% share. Reliance Communications' group head for marketing and
branding Sanjay Behl said the tablet market has doubled in a year.
"Reliance Tab has become the third largest after Apple and Samsung
tablets."
Source - TOI
