Tata Teleservices bets big on data products

Mobile telephony operator Tata Teleservices will launch a data card with WiFi facility in Tamil Nadu that enables five users to access internet at the same time, said a senior company official.

"Currently data cards enable only a single user to access the internet. A WiFi inbuilt Photon Max dongle/data card would enable five users to access the internet from different instruments at the same time," Rajan Gupta, head, mobility business unit, Tamil Nadu and Kerala, told IANS here Friday.

He said it will be useful for a family while on travel and also when the landline phone goes down for various reasons.

Pricing and other aspects are being finalised and the product will be launched first in Tamil Nadu, according to Gupta.

The company has beefed up the number of CDMA (code division multiple access) telecom towers to offer new data products.

He said the data products are offered under the CDMA technology while the voice telephony is under the GSM (global system for mobile communications) technology.

Tata Teleservices launched Friday a new data product Photon Max, a high speed mobile broadband access, here on prepay and post-pay platforms. The introductory price is Rs.1,299.

Speaking about the Tamil Nadu market, Gupta said the market size is around Rs.1,100 crore and it is a very important market for all mobile telephony players.

"Out of the total seven million mobile telephony subscriber base in Tamil Nadu, our share is around eight percent. In Kerala, the total subscriber base is around two million and our share is around six percent," Gupta said.

However, the average revenue per user (ARPU) in Kerala is around Rs.30 higher than that of ARPU derived in Tamil Nadu.

"In Kerala the data usage is more. Further, the number of overseas calls made by people there are higher than those in Tamil Nadu," he added.