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Estimates from the Indian Cellular Association suggest that nearly half the mobile handsets sold in India (4 mn of a total of 7 to 8 mn) every month are Internet-enabled. In fact, an Internet-enabled handset is available for as low as Rs 2,500. It is no surprise that, according to TRAI, in the April-June 2007 quarter, the number of subscribers accessing the Internet through mobile phones rose by a steep 7 mn, to touch 38 mn. This is about one-fifth of the total mobile subscriber base in India (200 mn) in that quarter. And the number of Internet connections (broadband plus dial-up) declined slightly to 9.22 mn in April-June 2007, from 9.27 mn in the previous quarter.

So, is your mobile phone becoming the default Internet access device? It would not be a surprise if it does.

For one, mobile penetration is much higher than PC penetration in India. For another, accessing the Internet through your mobile phone does not empty your wallet-and the costs are comparable to other forms of access.

Several applications are currently available for mobile Internet. For communication, text messaging is ubiquitous and inevitable. Checking email on the mobile phone, complete with attachments, downloading entertainment-related content, browsing news, and chatting are other common activities. Several websites are available for all of these. Booking railway tickets through a mobile Internet application by IRCTC is another such activity. Airtel has also recently made Google Search available to its subscribers, as online search on the mobile grows in popularity. M-commerce-online shopping through the mobile-is in its infancy, but holds promise. Publishing blogs through the mobile, receiving RSS feeds, sharing images and videos (through MMS or through the Net) and browsing mobile sites are also gaining ground.

Challenges remain. Providing high-speed access over the mobile device is the first of these. Small screens and smaller keypads of the mobile handset make the task of accessing the Internet even more onerous. Moreover, on a generic mobile browser, a website takes about 100 KB to load, which is huge, given the bandwidth.

Devices like the iPhone and BlackBerry make browsing and working on the mobile a simpler and richer experience. Browsers like the Opera Mini and the Safari Mini make websites lighter to load, though these cannot yet be used to install mobile applications. With the rise of Wi-Fi, the bandwidth issue will be tackled, and 3G could take mobile Internet to a different level.

Going forward what will be needed is cross-platform compatibility. This is one of the biggest challenges faced by mobile application developers. The existence of a common set of standards and mobile software development kits, which is widely adopted by device manufacturers, is seen as the possible solution for this. Social networking will put down roots in the mobile Internet world as well. In many ways the mobile Internet system is still in the initial stages of development. Much more exploration is needed about how and in what directions it can grow. But it will grow, and all indications are that this growth will be at an explosive pace.

For India the good news is that the concerns of low Internet penetration and expensive computers needed for connectivity have now got real answers. And a new business model for the service providers. With voice rates under constant pressure and SMS usage having a possible question mark, data-based Internet applications offer new revenue streams. According to TRAI, in Sep '07, the SMS usage per user came down as compared to the quarter ended June '07. A 7.4% decline in ARPUs across the two quarters has also been highlighted.

Right now, mobile Internet seems to be the best bet yet for raising ARPUs.

On that note, let's login.

shyamm@cybermedia.co.in