What are the trends in the mobile space, and how are they likely to evolve in the coming years?
India's telecom market is experiencing explosive growth. Operators are making mobile services more affordable and are further increasing coverage. And this coupled with lower handset prices is leading to the widening of the user base. But despite this record growth, the percentage of mobile phone users remains low. Hence, growth over the next few years is expected to continue at an accelerated speed as the various challenges are overcome. The IVR services along with mobile data and email will alo achieve high growth rates over the coming years.

What challenges did you face in establishing NDTV Convergence?
NDTV Convergence was established in January 2007 and is a 100% subsidiary of NDTV Networks. The challenges that we faced and continue to face are issues of Internet penetration and broadband connectivity. Also, the problems related to mobile and VAS are device and operator challenges including compatibility of handsets, congested networks leading to no bandwidth for data efficient applications, and challenges to increase the user base.

Sanjay Trehan CEO, NDTV Convergence

However, I believe that despite all this India is slowly emerging as the leader, with the world's youngest population, fastest mobile phone adoption rate, and the smartest minds. IPTV and mobile TV broadcasting are still in their infancy but are already posing a challenge to traditional vehicles of media broadcasting.

What is the prospect of the content market in India?
With technology being the leveller in this new media environment, content and its packaging will be the differentiator. The prospect of the content market in India is excellent, and the possibility to provide citizens news content in Hindi is promising.

We have launched NDTVKhabar to provide an interactive and empowering platform for our discerning Hindi audience. What makes us stand apart from other websites is that we repurpose the premium content produced by the NDTV group for cross-media platforms such as the Internet, mobile, ITV, and IPTV.

What was your objective behind the New Media Congress? Is it going to be an annual event?
The objective behind the New Media Congress is to bring some of the best minds in the Internet and mobile domain under one roof to learn, grasp, and debate on some of the developments in these fast moving industries. It was also an attempt to establish NDTV Convergence as a thought leader in the new media domain. After the incredible success of our first New Media Congress, we intend to make this an annual event.

Arpita Prem
arpitap@cybermedia.co.in