Icenet launches high speed dial-up service

Icenet, the largest internet service provider (ISP) in Gujarat has launched IceXpress, a dial-up internet service that is five times faster than normal dial-up services, virtually providing browsing speeds of a broadband connection.

This comes at a time when several ISPs are exiting the dial-up internet business for want of speeds in dial-up internet.

With the launch of the IceXpress, Icenet aims at raising its market share in Gujarat from the existing 35 per cent to over 75 per cent in the next few months.

Icenet will convert all its 30,000-odd dial-up users to IceXpress and will offer them a free trial period for a month. Subsequently, it will increase internet charges by between 10 to 15 per cent, but customers will save up to 40 per cent costs because of higher speeds, said Icenet officials.

"Icenet now provides its customers with dial-up internet connections with five times the speed. In other words, customers can actually have broadband speeds with a dial-up service. This being a revolutionary technique, Icenet aims to more than double its share of customers in Gujarat and we expect both dial-up and broadband users of other ISPs to move to IceXpress," said Icenet CEO and MD Chirag Mehta, while addressing media persons in Ahmedabad on Tuesday.

Over 99 per cent (99.4) per cent users in India still use dial-up internet services as compared to around 86 per cent in the US.

"Dial-up internet is here to stay and will continue to be dominant for at least a decade more before broadband internet actually becomes more popular. So while other players are attempting to exit the dial-up business because it offers low speeds, we have concentrated on dial-up by making browsing five times faster," Mehta said.

Explaining the technology behind making dial-up internet five times faster, Mehta said that this works on a unique compression technology.

"IceXpress compresses the data five times using a proprietary and patented technology, and sends it over to customers using the existing dial-up phone line," Mehta said. Customers will however require to install a software, which they can download free from the ISPs website.

"Broadband will still continue to be priced almost double to dial-up. With this technology though, we expect a huge migration to IceXpress," Mehta stated.

He said that while there have been several innovations in broadband internet, dial-up internet has not been touched so far. This product, he said, will provide the required boost to the dial-up internet market.