Airtel launches portal

Mobile service provider Airtel became the first in South India and second in the country to launch a regional language value-added services (VAS) portal on Friday.

Its Kannada VAS portal was launched in Mysore enabling customers to download ring tones, devotional songs, dedicate a song to their loved ones or download and listen to special superstar content. Astrology, news and other services will be made available shortly on the portal.

Launching the new portal Karnataka's CEO of Bharti Airtel Mobile Services V Venkatesh said Airtel has chosen Mysore to launch the Kannada portal as it was the cultural capital of Karnataka.

"Music downloads is going to revolutionise the music industry in the country," he said and added, "In China this is more than the music industry itself. Music is downloaded more than the music sold across the counters in that country," he said expressing confidence at a similar growth in music download business.

"We are also going to launch an Airtel mobile station where the customer can listen to FM radio - songs of his choice in full - at an affordable price," he said, adding about 8,000 songs were listed.

An Airtel customer needs to call 51111 at Re. 1 a minute with a monthly rental of Rs 15 for the portal services. Without paying rental, he can access the service at Rs 2 per minute. "The monthly rental is cheaper than other portals," Venkatesh said.

Claiming Airtel as the undisputed leader in Karnataka, the CEO said it had added a mind-boggling 2.2 million customers to its network in the last 12 months. This accounts for 48 per cent of the total population going mobile in the State.

With this, Airtel's market share in the State has gone up from 32 to 39 per cent. Presently it has close to five million customers of whom over 80 per cent are looking for Kannada content.

As regards the expansion, Venkatesh said the aim was to cover over 5,200 towns and villages, across the districts of Mysore, Mandya, Chamarajanagar, Hassan and Kodagu in the coming year.

It was covering over 7.9 lakh population or 76 per cent of the overall population and planned to take it up to 85 per cent by next year. It is increasing the number of retail outlets from 5,700 to 8,000 by FY'08. ¿We have the highest market share in this circle, ¿the CEO said.