Spice Comm launches new schemes

Spice Communications launched a number of value-added services today in order to attract younger subscribers.

According to the company, these non-voice services are likely to be major growth drivers in the future.

It has launched the background music scheme, through which a user can have music of his choice playing in the background during a conversation.

To subscribe to this scheme, a user has to pay Rs 20 per month as well as Rs 10 per song download. Spice has also launched the Incoming Call Block service through which a user can create a 'blacklist' of all the number he wants to block. This service will also have a monthly rental of Rs 20 plus Rs 5 for every number, which the user wants barred.

Spice Radio will allow users to listen to and dedicate songs of their choice anytime of the day through a smart music station. Users can also send instant messages from their handsets. Subscribers can create a buddy list and they can send messages to these numbers anytime in the day after logging on to the Internet.

This service will require a GPRS-enabled phone and, at present, users can only chat with Spice subscribers. This service will have a monthly rental of Rs 49 plus the charges for being online. The services will be made available to Spice subscribers both in Karnataka and Punjab. "Till now, Spice is present in 180 towns in Karnataka and by the end of this year, we are looking at touching 300 towns. Value-added services account for about 10 per cent of the company's revenues and we are hoping to take this share to 15 per cent in the next six months," Spice Communication's vice-president (sales and marketing) Rakesh Kumar Singh said.