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LiveMint.com Wednesday, Mar 12 2008 Reliance Entertainment Pvt. Ltd, the media and entertainment arm of the Reliance Anil Dhirubhai Ambani Group (R-Adag) that has interests in film production, distribution and exhibition, FM radio, Internet businesses and television content is set to enter the broadcasting space, a company official close to the development and who did not wish to be identified said. The firm will launch two new companies—Reliance Big TV Entertainment Pvt. Ltd and Reliance Big TV News Pvt. Ltd—to launch and operate a bouquet of about 20 channels. The news broadcasting company will launch four channels: two general news channels and two business news channels, one each in Hindi and English in both genres. The non-news broadcasting company will launch music and movie channels, fivegeneral entertainment channels, and dedicated channels focused on children andlifestyle. The Hindi general entertainment channel and three regional movie channels are likely to be launched by August. Reliance Entertainment recently approached the ministry of information and broadcasting for mandatory approvals for its channels. On 8 February, the firm said investor George Soros had picked up a 3% stake in it for Rs.395 crore, giving Reliance Entertainment a valuation of Rs13,035 crore. R-Adag, through several affiliates and group companies, holds substantial equity stakes in several media and entertainment firms. These include NDTV Ltd, ETC Networks Ltd, TV Today Network Ltd, Padmalaya Telefilms Ltd and UTV Software Communications Ltd. The market value of R-Adag’s investments in the media and entertainment sector, as on 31 December 2007, the latest quarter for which data is available, was Rs.952.09 crore. The firm is also betting big on the Internet space and plans to launch at least eight new websites this year, including a jobs portal and a classifieds portal. The firm already runs gaming portal Zapak, social networking site BigAdda, and online movie rental business Big Flicks.

R-ADAG's BIG Pictures to launch formally with 30+ films Businessofcinema.com - 24/03/08 MUMBAI: The cat's finally out of the bag! Reliance Anil Dhirubhai Ambani Group's (ADAG) entertainment arm, which has been doing its ground-work on the motion picture business for the last one year, has now firmed up its plans. The formal launch of the company's motion picture banner - BIG Pictures - is slated to take place in the coming two weeks. Additionally, all movies that were under the Adlabs umbrella are likely to come under BIG Pictures. All in all, the company has more than 30 movies lined-up that are under various stages of development. Last year, Businessofcinema.com was the first to report that Reliance is setting up its BIG boutique, which will house all the entertainment related businesses of the company. BIG Pictures is betting big on Hindi as well as regional films. Businessofcinema.com is privy to the company's line-up of more than 30 films that will release over the next two - three years. In the regional cinema space, BIG Pictures has trained its eyes on Bengali films and has at least 12 films in the pipeline. Directors like Rituparno Ghosh, Buddhadeb Dasgupta, Shwopan Shah and Haranath Chakraborty will be directing films for Ambani's banner. Ghosh's film Sab Choritra Kalponik starring Bipasha Basu is also a part of the bouquet. Apart from Bengali cinema, BIG also has two- three Tamil films, a Telugu film, and two Malayalam films. One of the Malayalam films will have south star Mammootty in the lead. As far as Hindi films are concerned, BIG Pictures has a five film deal with Ritesh Sidhwani and Farhan Akhtar's Excel Entertainment, a three film deal with Vidhu Vinod Chopra and a two film deal with Sudhir Mishra. On the other hand, film projects under Adlabs' wing, which may shift to the BIG Pictures banner include acquisitions and productions like Dulha Mil Gaya, Love Story 2050, Halla, Rajnikanth's animated flick Sultan, B R Films' Banda Yeh Bindaas Hai starring Govinda, Tabu and Lara Dutta, overseas rights of Aamir Khan starrer Gajini, Ahmed Khan produced Paathshala starring Shahid Kapur and Nana Patekar, 13 B starring Madhavan (which is also simultaneously being made in Tamil and is titled Yavaram Nallam) and a Punjabi film Mera Pind - My Home directed by Manmohan Singh. According to industry sources, Excel Entertainment will be delivering all five films by the first quarter of 2011. These include Don 2, Rock On, Luck By Chance and Voice From The Sky. While Don 2 will Shah Rukh Khan, Rock On will be Farhan Akhtar's debut as an actor. The film also stars Arjun Rampal, Prachi Desai, Purab Kohli, Sahana Goswami and Luke Kenny and is currently on floors. It is being directed by Abhishek Kapoor and is slated to release in August this year. Zoya Akhtar's directorial venture Luck By Chance will star Farhan Akhtar and Konkona Sen Sharma with Hrithik Roshan in a special appearance. Luck By Chance will go on floors in the first week of April and will release towards the end of the year. Farhan Akhtar's second film Voice From The Sky is a period film depicting the era when telephones came into existence. This will be directed by Akhtar before Don 2. Other films include an untitled thriller by Reema Kagti. BIG Pictures' co-production deal with Sushir Mishra includes two films - Good Soldier starring Sanjay Suri and Mammootty and Who's Speaking tentatively starring Shiney Ahuja. The films from Vidhu Vinod Chopra's banner include Idiot directed by Rajkumar Hirani starring Aamir Khan and Kareena Kapoor along with two more which are still under finalization. With this mammoth line-up, BIG Pictures is slated to make some BIG noise in the coming days in the Indian motion picture industry.

@hetal wow !!!

Economic Times 17 Mar, 2008, 2230 Anil Ambani-led Reliance Communications is understood to have roped in Orange Telecom to use the French company's brand for offering services. The move comes within days of RCom's rival Tata Teleservices announcing their tie-up with British giant virgin. When contacted, Reliance Communications officials declined to comment. Tata's deal with Virgin had created a furore among other operators, with the GSM lobby group COAI writing to the Department of Telecom seeking its view whether a mobile virtual network operator (MVNO) was allowed in the country. Tatas were quick to clarify that they had entered into a brand franchise agreement with Virgin, whereby they would be using their brand to offer services to cater to the youth segment. Meanwhile, RCom officials did not elaborate on the contours of the deal with Orange Telecom. Orange to ride Reliance Communications in second coming Business Standard / Mumbai March 18, 2008 Reliance Communications (RCom) plans to launch France Telecom’s Orange brand in India, under a franchisee agreement, much like the recent Tata Teleservices and UK-based Virgin Mobile deal. For Orange, this would be a second coming as the brand was earlier operational in the country through GSM operator Hutchison-Essar (now Vodafone-Essar). The Anil Ambani group company is in advanced talks with France Telecom for a branding, marketing and franchisee agreement. The company plans to launch the brand by the second quarter of FY09, according to sources close to the development. Initially, the Orange may be launched on RCom’s CDMA network – spanning across 23,000 towns and 5 lakh villages in India – and later extended to its 8 GSM circles. The Indian company has a total of 44.5 million subscribers in India. Under the tie-up, both the companies are believed to be discussing introducing data-rich handsets to be sold exclusively under the Orange brand. The companies are also planning to launch high-end e-mail PDA devices, apart from a range of value-added services (VAS) in the Indian market. When contacted a Reliance Communications’ spokesperson refused to comment, saying the group won’t comment on speculations. According to industry analysts, RCom is looking at a tie-up with France Telecom, due to Orange brand’s high recall value. If the companies sign an agreement, then this would be second time Orange services would be available in India. The brand had exited the country in 2005, after its agreement with Hutchison-Essar ended. Hutchison-Essar had moved over to the ‘Hutch’ brand. Orange is the key brand of France Telecom Group, one of the world’s leading telecommunications operators with over 153 million customers in 220 countries across the globe.

H A P P Y --- H O L I

@KumaarShah: Yes, I had edited it earlier.

PPC 6800 from ebay.com is not RUIM enabled by default. You need to convert it to RUIM enabled to make it work with Reliance. Thanks for releasing the new ROM for 6800, Hetal!

end of rumour! France Telecom Denies Plans to License Orange Brand to Reliance Communications Dow Jones Newswires - 18th March 2008 PARIS - France Telecom has denied it plans to license its Orange brand to Reliance Communications in India. "France Telecom dismisses the rumors of a tie-up with Reliance Communications in India as being the result of market speculation," a France Telecom spokesman said. Earlier Tuesday, the Business Standard in India reported that Reliance Communications was in advanced talks with France Telecom to launch the Orange brand in India, citing unnamed sources. A person familiar with the development told Dow Jones Newswires earlier Tuesday that Reliance was in "exploratory" talks with France Telecom over the use of the Orange brand.

The Financial Express March 17, 2008 The year 2008 would be one when the telecom sector would see a lot of action and a recharge that could take the fast-paced growth to another level. The telecom ministry has lined up an action plan, which includes the auctioning of 3G licences and number portability. According to Siddhartha Behura, telecom secretary and chairman of the Telecom Commission, the year-end could well see both these milestones met. The broad-based guidelines issued by the ministry would be finalised and a detailed version of the guidelines will be made available by the end of the month, said Behura. For this, the ministry and the commission will not employ internal experts, but would rather have external experts. This time, Behura added, the 3G guidelines would be accompanied by directions on Wi-max as well. “We will then have a beauty parade of the candidates wanting to offer 3G services,” quipped Behura. And by November or December-end, the services could be in place, he added. As regards to another landmark implementation, number portability, which will allow mobile users to change their cellphone service provider and still maintain the current number, things are afoot at a rapid clip. Right now, the Trai is working out the details, which will be expected by the end of the month, said Behura. And after other practical deliberations, and testing, number portability could be reality by the end of the year, Behura asserted. Answering queries posed by institutional investors and the media at the India-Asia Investment Forum in Singapore, Behura clarified that he was in a dialogue with the concerned authorities in the defence services to work around the spectrum release issue. “There is a lack of clarity in this areas and the dialogue is expected to resolve this,” said Behura. He pointed out that spectrum issues varied from area to area. This is because the defence had different spectrum requirements in different geographies. Hence, it becomes difficult to generalise the spectrum needs, added Behura. On the matter of the recent Blackberry issue, Behura again clarified that there is an intense dialogue on with the defence sector and also Blackberry. And that the ministry and policy makers are committed to work around security concerns and organisational requirements to build a solution for this popular service. The secretary also mentioned the need for players to look beyond the spectrum issues and look towards investing in innovative technologies for expansion as well. He also pointed towards the possibility of strong consolidation in the sector that could lead to only five odd players being able to live out competitive forces in the sector.

Other Telcom Operators unimpressed by Virgin`s scheme Business Standard / Mumbai March 18, 2008 Indian telecom operators will take time to roll out ‘get paid for receiving calls’ scheme despite its launch by British telecom company Virgin Mobile. The telecom operators are not so convinced of the scheme’s potential. The operators believe that the industry is not ready for these services, even though such plans are good for users in Singapore. The service charges in the country are already lowest in the world and will not slide further for sometime. Moreover, this is also against the existing practice of an operator trying to match every scheme launched by competitors. “We have no intentions of introducing the plan at present. At the end of the day, products and prices should be evaluated in their totality, and so, we have never considered launching a package or service in isolation,” said Bharti Airtel President (Mobile Services) Sanjay Kapoor. Adding that Bharti Airtel’s services were ‘competitive’, he said, the company evaluates market conditions before launching any scheme. Ditto for Idea Cellular, Reliance Communications and Vodafone Essar. The companies’ executives have confirmed that there were no immediate plans to launch the services. BPL Mobile Director and CEO S Subramaniam, said, “We have no immediate plans to roll out the services as we believe the eco-system in the country is not ready to support this. These schemes will not be beneficial to established players In India even though they will help companies starting operations to get a foothold in the country.” According to an analyst, who did not want to be named, the plans are unexpected as an operator launches similar or even better schemes than its competitors. Launching Virgin Mobile telecom brand in India under a franchisee agreement with CDMA company Tata Teleservices, the UK-based Virgin Group ushered in the regime of ‘making payments to users for receiving calls’. The company is crediting airtime worth 10 paise to a user’s account for every 60-second call received. Although it did not divulge details of the scheme, industry analysts were of opinion that the company was crediting one-third of the termination charges received from other players. The termination charges for a 60-second call are 30 paise at present. “The model which all of us are looking at, involves crediting airtime to the user for listening to a 10-second advertisement jingle. But this will take time as advertisers and mobile operators will have to gear up for this regime,” said Subramaniam.

Paris, France, Herndon, VA March 17, 2008 InfoVista, the leader in delivering proven solutions for proactive service assurance, announced today with Reliance Communications, India’s largest telecommunications company, that InfoVista’s suite of solutions have been successfully deployed and used by Reliance Communications Network Operations teams to monitor the performance of Reliance Network. “InfoVista’s performance management solutions will play a critical role in our ability to address the scalability challenges of network expansion,” said Suresh Rangachar, President, Reliance Communications. “InfoVista is a key partner in our efforts to meet these current initiatives in India and our goal of becoming a top ten global service provider.” “As India’s largest service provider, Reliance Communications is a strategic customer, providing a solid foothold into the region and further cementing our leadership position among tier-one service providers around the world,” said Serge Genetet, Senior Vice President, Asia-Pacific Operations, InfoVista. “The Asia-Pacific telecommunications industry is an important market for InfoVista and our solutions provide the scalability, flexibility and visibility large service providers like Reliance Communications require to support their expansion.” About InfoVista InfoVista empowers telecom operators, services providers and large enterprises to maximize business return and productivity by assuring the optimal performance of mission-critical networked services, applications and infrastructures. Eighty percent of the world’s largest service providers and more than 30 of the top 100 global corporations rely on InfoVista’s proven solutions for Proactive Service Assurance to foresee potential service issues before they impact end users, improve business effectiveness, reduce operating risk, lower cost of operations, increase agility and create competitive advantage. Sample customers include Bell Canada, Bharti, BNP Paribas, British Telecom, Cable & Wireless, CitiGroup, Defense Information Systems Agency (DISA), Deutsche Telekom, Fidelity Investments, JP Morgan Chase, SFR, SingTel, T-Mobile, Telefonica, and Telstra. www.infovista.com

Samsung MAX SCH-F679 added. Thank you.

Express News Service Chandigarh, March 14 The consumer forum has directed Reliance Communications to pay Rs 5,000 as compensation to a consumer for sending him fake telephone bills. When the consumer approached the company, they terminated services to his existing telephone number for five days. Prem Dass Sharma, a resident of Sector 43, had subscribed to a landline connection and a broadband connection from the company in August 2007. In the first month, the company dispatched a bill of an additional telephone he said he had never subscribed to. After persuasions, the company waived off the bill of the false telephone connection. Sharma later requested the company officials to make corrections in their records and remove the fake telephone against his name. Acting on the application, the officials disconnected the existing telephone number for five days. The consumer forum found the company used unfair trade practices and held it liable for deficiency in its services. They directed the firm to pay the amount to the complainant within 30 days from the receipt of the copy of the order, failing which they would be liable to pay amount along with the interest.

Look who wants to read your emails 16 Mar 2008, Times News Network When Canadian company Research In Motion (RIM) launched BlackBerry in 1999, within no time the revolutionary mobile dev- ice that enabled users to browse the Net, read emails in realtime and send fax documents earned the nickname, CrackBerry, an allusion to its notoriously addictive features. There is wry irony, therefore, in the government's own "crackberry" operation to acquire the keys that would give it power to decode and access the millions of emails sent and received by BlackBerry subscribers. Like all secure internet services, RIM uses an encryption code that scrambles the email messages sent out from a BlackBerry device and then unscrambles it again when the message reaches its target. Only, Blackberry uses a highly complex algorithm for the purpose - a 256-bit advanced encryption standard (AES) process. Cyber experts say Indian intelligence agencies have decryption software that's at least two generations older. The Intelligence Bureau (IB) can, it is believed, decode messages with an encryption level of up to 40 bits though informed sources say it's in the process of acquiring a bit more advanced software. (According to cyber security experts, there's a rigid decryption technology hierarchy in the world: The US has the most advanced software, Europe gets tech that's one generation behind and countries like India have even older decoders.) So, if intelligence agencies cannot crack BlackBerry's email code, they can still do one of two things - get the government to force RIM to scale down its encryption code to 40 bits, or better still, ask for the "keys" that will unlock the code. These are the contours of the standoff between the government on one side, and RIM and the telecom operators who provide BlackBerry services on the other. Though the government's reported threat of blacking out the service in India has receded after a meeting last Friday between the parties concerned, the stakes were high as a ban would have hit more than 4 lakh BlackBerry users. RIM is still required to provide a solution that will enable security agencies to "access" its email traffic. Inherent in the controversy was an issue that got little attention: Why should the government be seeking the right to snoop on all BlackBerry users? Says cyber law expert Pavan Duggal, "This issue, I feel, is the first chapter of a controversy that will have many ramifications. What's being sought here is blanket surveillance. The intelligence agencies would have access to all the emails going through all BlackBerries in the country. One understands the security concerns, and ISPs have been cooperating with the government on this, but such overarching powers go against people's constitutional rights and can be challenged in court as violation of Article 21 of the Constitution, which guarantees the right to life." Duggal says section 69 of the IT Act, 2000, does give the government the power to intercept electronic information, but such sweeping surveillance is clearly stretching the law. "And, what impact will it have on e-commerce? People will be extremely concerned about sending business details through the Net." In the 1990s, the Supreme Court lay down a detailed procedure for tapping of phones by the government in the PUCL vs GOI case. The judgment marked a clear line between actions that are legal and those that aren't. Experts feel the absence of a similar encryption law in the country is allowing the government space to move into fuzzy territory. The task of formulating this law has now been given to the National Technical Research Organisation, an apex body on cyber security issues. But stakeholders in the IT sector say other laws too need to be upgraded. For instance, says Rajesh Chharia, president of the Internet Service Providers' Association of India, "the licencing norms for ISPs were created in 1998-99. Accordingly, licences issued to ISPs forbid encryption above 40 bits. Today, a 40-bit code can be cracked in no time. A browser like Internet Explorer 7 has a 128-bit code. So, any web provider using an encryption of over 40 bits has to provide the keys to the government.'' This, of course, means that the government has the means to track transactions and correspondences in these websites - an access it doesn't have in the BlackBerry platform since the ISPs providing these services were, for some reason, never asked to hand over the encoding key. So, is the Indian state turning Orwellian, intent on keeping a watchful on its flock in the breach of privacy norms? "This is a huge exaggeration,'' says Maloy Krishna Dhar, former joint director, IB. "In practice, there never is any blanket search of cyber traffic. Intelligence agencies always conduct targeted searches. We have a list of suspected individuals and email IDs - the numbers may run into thousands - and the computer tracks activities of these persons. This itself is a huge task for a small organization like IB.'' Dhar says certain compromises will have to be made because of the times. "It is a contradictory situation. We have high personal liberties and also a high level of security threat. BlackBerry, for instance, is a new tool in the hands of terrorists. To deal with that, there may be some curtailment in privacy." Terror organizations are constantly changing their footprint and upgrading their technology, he says. "Today, if we have tracked, say, 555 webpages linked to the terror network, tomorrow they may all disappear and return modified. It's a nightmarish scenario for security agencies." Dhar admits that powers of surveillance can be misused. "That's a devil you have to live with. Unfortunately, the legal and political framework needed to check misuse of cyber-snooping by our politicians is lacking in the country," he adds. That's a point many cyber experts are making. Can the intelligence agencies ensure fairplay? As Duggal puts it, "People may be willing to give up some of their civil liberties for dealing with the security threat to the country. But there should be a clear-cut policy framework and laws on what kind of invasion is lawful and what's not." Clearly, there's room for legislative action and transparency in cyberspace.

If the Government wants, they can gain access to your email with the help of the email provider. With Blackberry, it is claimed that even RIM can't access your emails! Good to know that they are not going to ban BlackBerry services in India!

added "GSM Handset" option

Even though Microsoft has Push Mail feature for Windows Mobile, the convenience doesn't come near that of using a Blackberry which is a class of its own. It is built specifically for E-mail communication and comparing it with a PDA/Smarphone won't be logical. BlackBerry opens a Pandora's box Business Standard March 12, 2008 01:51 IST Indian operators offering BlackBerry services, top executives of Canadian telco Research in Motion (RIM), the company that owns the brand, security agencies and officials of the Department of Telecommunications (DoT) are expected to meet on March 14 to answer the concerns of security agencies in a bid to prevent having BlackBerry services terminated after the March-end deadline. BlackBerry has an estimated 400,000 subscribers in India. RIM has been asked to give access to its algorithims (needed to decrypt messages), according to a source. "The security agencies are saying that we should have access to data that are being encrypted by services like BlackBerry on mobile phones and then decrypted when the phone reaches its nominated destination," the source added. RIM does not, or has not been asked, to do this in any other country but is considering the matter. The case, meanwhile, has opened a Pandora's box in India. Operators note that if BlackBerry services are banned, security agencies could even target various e-commerce applications � especially money transfers � that use encryption. Encryption is the process of converting information into a form that is unintelligible to anyone except holders of a specific cryptographic key (the intended recipient). This will make e-commerce virtually impossible. "The argument can logically be extended to all encrypted transactions on wireless devices including banking, e-commerce, email and chat. It will also have a significant impact on privacy concerns for consumers. Much thought needs to be applied before deciding on it," said Alok Shende, Practice Head, Datamonitor India. Indeed, scrutiny has already been stepped up for all Internet Service Providers (ISPs). Rajesh Chharia, President, Internet Service Providers Association of India (ISPAI), noted: "Routine check-ups are fine with us since the issue is one of national security. All ISPs must, and will, cooperate. What is of concern, though, is the fact that we have been asked to reduce the encryption from 128-bit to 40-bit, which is ridiculous." The demand, he said, will put the entire online banking and e-commerce sectors in jeopardy. Having represented our concerns, we have yet to receive a response from DoT on this issue." Cyberlaw experts, too, are concerned over the developments. While the government's motive is good, the Indian Information Technology (IT) Act, 2000 is very unclear on this subject, noted Pavan Duggal, Supreme Court advocate and cyberlaw expert. "Only Section 69 (Sub-section 2) gives the Controller of Certifying Authority the power to order the interception of electronic communication on computer systems located in India," he points out. In RIM's case, though, decryption is not possible without RIM's consent, which is why the government is fuming. "This is, perhaps, the first time that the government is admitting to intercepting electronic communication. Blanket power to intercept emails will probably end up diluting the legal validity of encrypted communication in an age when privacy is of utmost importance to corporate and individuals. The Indian government could be firm, asking RIM (or any other player) to take action on a specific case that arouses suspicion. It may not be wise and practical to ban the services altogether," said Na Vijayashankar, cyberlaw expert. Some technology experts like Vijay Mukhi note that if the email originates from India, it can be intercepted at the wireless service provider's end, since the nodes are in India. The problem arises if the email originates from a BlackBerry device (since it goes to a server outside India where it gets encrypted). Even then, monitoring every mail that emanates from a server outside India will lead to a ridiculous state of affairs. All email services with servers in foreign lands will have to be shut down. Google and Yahoo declined to comment on the issue and Microsoft India said the issue was not of immediate concern to them. Sumeet Gugnani, Director, Mobile Communication Business, Microsoft India, said: "Windows Mobile-enabled handheld devices and cellphones enable users to configure mails on their respective in-house (read in India) exchange servers if they so wish."

October 09, 2007 01:23 IST Business Standard The Reliance Anil Dhirubhai Ambani Group and the Tatas have competition on hand. Consumer electronics to power giant Videocon, which has applied for a unified access service licence, will be using the code division multiple access and not the global system for mobile technology to roll out its mobile services. Confirming the development, Chairman Venugopal Dhoot said, "We will use the CDMA technology for mobile services in the country." Videocon has also said that it was in talks with a US telecom major to partner for the services. However, it declined to comment on the possible talks with US telecom major Verizon as a partner. Dhoot said, "We cannot divulge the name of the partner." The move by Videocon might be a strategic one as most of the 300 other applicants have shown interest in running the GSM service. As a result, the shortage for spectrum will be restricted to GSM and not among CDMA players. At the moment, there are only two players in the CDMA space, with Bharat Sanchar Nigam Limited having only limited operations in some circles. The government has around 20 MHz of spectrum, which it hopes to vacate from the defence services. However, experts in the business say that the key reason for most companies opting for GSM is better valuation. Industry experts say globally the move is shifting towards GSM rather than for the proprietary technology from Qualcomm in the CDMA space. In India, even CDMA players, such as Reliance, have publicly made their choice for GSM and applied for pan-India licence. According to a telecom analyst, "Most investors are ready to pay a premium for GSM companies and of course there are more telecom players in the GSM space." Dhoot of course faces competition from over 20-30 big to small companies, which have put in applications for a pan-India UAS licence. These include realty developers such as Unitech, DLF, Parasvnath, and Omaxe among others; companies ranging from steel majors such as Ispat group, telecom firm such as HFCL.

See: http://www.rimweb.in/forums/index.php?showtopic=12281

Sunday, Mar 09, 2008 New Delhi The Union Home Ministry’s objection over Tata Teleservices application for offering advanced BlackBerry services, including e-mails on mobile handsets, has left other mobile operators already offering this service unnerved. Any blanket ban on the service could hit about five-lakh subscribers who are now using the BlackBerry service. This development has brought to the limelight other service providers who offer similar facilities. A product of Canadian firm ‘Research In Motion’ (RIM), BlackBerry is a patented service that provides wireless e-mail solution to mobile professionals and individuals, just like SMS on any conventional mobile phone. Citing security reasons, the Union Home Ministry wants access to all communications made through a mobile device at any given time, which is not done now in the case of BlackBerry device which works through a server and data is transferred in an encrypted format. As Blackberry does not allow for any interception, the Centre sees this as a security threat, particularly in the current scenario where terrorist organisations are using the Internet to communicate. While leading mobile operators like Bharti Airtel, Vodafone-Essar and Reliance Communications are already offering BlackBerry services, denial to Tata Teleservices will not only hit the growth of the telecom market but also widen differences between various operators. Tata Teleservices has already sought a clarification from the Department of Telecommunications (DoT) as to why only it was being singled out. After the Home Ministry’s action, the DoT has swung into action and written to other BlackBerry service providers stating that they will have to provide monitoring facility for lawful interception of data transferred through the device. Operators have already held talks with senior DoT and Home Ministry officials, and soon they are likely to meet the Telecom Secretary to discuss the issue. Apart from BlackBerry handsets, other advanced mobile devices are also there in the market that offer e-mail and push-mail facilities, which might now be brought under the scanner of the Union Home Ministry and the DoT. These devices gives professionals wireless access to their offices and workstations while they are away, thus improving their efficiency and helping them work while on the move.

DoT seal on Tata-Virgin deal The Telegraph March 5, 2008 The department of telecommunications (DoT) has given the Tata Teleservices-Virgin mobile deal a clean chit, while the GSM lobby is crying foul over the deal. DoT secretary Siddharth Behura said today: “We’d asked Tata Teleservices to provide the details of their agreement with Virgin Mobile, which they are expected to provide soon.” An arm of the DoT — the wireless planning and co-ordination wing — will submit a report on the deal within 10 days. Officials of the DoT said a greater clarity on the alliance would be obtained once the department gets the report. Asked whether Virgin Mobile’s entry required clearances from the DoT and the Foreign Investment Promotion Board, Behura said: “Virgin hasn’t come as a foreign investor, it is only a franchisee. Whatever royalty that will have to be paid for this is an internal matter between Tata and Virgin. It doesn’t require approvals from the DoT.” Finance ministry officials said laws allowed foreign telecom companies to set up shop as a franchisee. However, “they would require approval if they were to repatriate royalty fees from an Indian company for the use of a foreign brand name”. Earlier this week, the GSM lobby Cellular Operators Association of India (COAI) had written to the DoT, asking it to look into the agreement and clarify whether the Tata-Virgin deal was really a franchisee agreement. The COAI has sought to know in what capacity Virgin Mobile is entering the Indian market and the terms and conditions of the agreement with the Tatas. “The DoT hasn’t conveyed anything to us so far. Usually, in a franchise agreement, the franchisee company uses the name of the parent company and pays for it. In this case, it’s Tata Teleservices which is paying Virgin for the use of its brandname. We find this arrangement very peculiar,” said COAI director-general T.V. Ramachandran. CDMA player Reliance Communications has also alleged that Virgin was trying to disguise its entry as an MVNO (mobile virtual network operator) in India with Branson’s attention seeking tactics. Under the MVNO model, telecom operators buy talk time on wholesale rates from existing mobile operators and then sell it to subscribers under their own brand. The government has been thinking of opening up this sector but has not done so. Ramachandran said under the deal with the Tatas, Virgin was providing incentives on airtime to customers. “How is that possible without Virgin buying bulk airtime from the Tatas, which amounts to the deal being an MVNO.” However, Tata Teleservices and Virgin Mobile are seeing the deal in terms of brand extension.

Neither, but there was a telecom company called Airtel in Spain who owned the domain "airtel.com" and that company was acquired by Vodafone in 2000, so they became the owners of the domain "airtel.com" as well.

not sure which for which consumer segment is that plan targetted for... 150 MB data transfer per month!

hmmm, interesting... though I'm not sure if such a lesser know company can meet quality standards and after sales support?