World Phone Internet Services, a category 'A' internet service provider (ISP), announced on Thursday the launch of World Phone Premium calling cards. | |
| The cards work on similar lines as the STD call cards available instead of the normal phone lines. The cards are meant for VoIP usage. With the cards, calls to the USA, where 80 per cent of international calls from India are directed, can be made for Rs 1.60 per minute. |
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| "We have been into providing VoIP over broadband for corporates. One of our packages in that space is unlimited VoIP calls for Rs 7,000. This is our first foray into the retail space," said Aditya Ahluwalia, chairman, World Phone Internet Services. |
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| The cards, available in denominations of Rs 100, Rs 250, Rs 500 and Rs 1,000 can be used to make calls from either the PC or combination phones which allow for connecting to the internet. |
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| "We realised that launching it only for PCs would restrict our market since the PC penetration in India is very low. That's why we have fashioned the cards to function over phonelines as well. We are also buying phone devices from hardware vendors like Cisco, Motorola and D-Link and customers have the choice of buying these from us for as well for as low as Rs 5,000," said Ahluwalia. |
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| According to him, the company can afford to sell these at prices lower than the vendors themselves because they import it in bulk and are not looking at profiting from the hardware. |
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| With the card, all a customer has to do is download a free dialer from www.worldphone.co.in and use the PIN and password provided on the card to connect to any number in a foreign country. The same simplicity is applied while connecting via an IP phone also. Account details can be checked on the web after each call. |
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| World Phone has tied up with Paras Communications to distribute the cards. They will concentrate on Bangalore and Mysore in the first quarter and move to class B cities from the second quarter. Paras will use 20 dealers and 40 resellers under each dealer. |
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| Each dealer is expected to contribute around Rs 5,000 worth of sales every month. World Phone provides the service in partnership with Go2Call, a US-based international VoIP service provider, where the company will use its expertise to maintain backend operations and support voice traffic over its networks. |
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| "We realise that there are several other ISPs offering VoIP. But it must be noted that we offer these calls at one-third the cost at which others offer it," said Ahluwalia. |
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| Interestingly, while calls to the US cost only Rs 1.60, those made to Saudi Arabia will cost Rs 8 per minute. When asked about this huge price differential, he said that rates were sometime a measure of monopoly or competition the foreign company's telecom market was and also the kind of volumes that could be promised from India. |
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| World Phone, which started operations in 2001 with an initial capital of Rs 10 crore, has the backing of US-based WPI Group. The company has invested 25 pr cent of the capital in this new project. |
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| Revenues for last fiscal was recorded at Rs 6 crore, but the company expects to touch Rs 50 crore this fiscal fuelled by a growth of 10 per cent every month and the launch of VoIP in the retail space. It is also looking to earn nearly Rs 1 crore profits for the fiscal. |
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| "We wish to provide applications over the net rather than plain service provision. In the future we will look to expand our offerings to include other services like video telephony," said Ahluwalia. |
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