India’s Broadband Penetration Remains Dismal, Ranks 122nd In World!

With the internet penetration increasing year-by-year in India, most of us would be tempted to say that India has progressed a lot in terms of internet subscribers and thus, broadband penetration. Unfortunately, it is not so. One look at a recently released report by Broadband Commission and the bubble goes bust.

The Broadband Commission For Digital Development, a United Nations set-up, launched by the International Telecommunication Union (ITU) and the United Nations Educational, has come out with their Annual Broadband Penetration 2013 Report. With this Report, the Broadband Commission expands awareness and understanding of the importance of broadband networks, services, and applications for generating economic growth, and for achieving social progress. The Commission has viewed broadband as a cluster of concepts: always-on, high-capacity connectivity enabling combined provision of multiple services simultaneously.

According to the report, in India, broadband has already generated nearly 9 million direct and indirect jobs, while a 1% increase in broadband penetration has potential to add US$2.7 bn or 0.11% to Indian GDP in 2015.

Already CISCO pilot projects in several states in India have resulted in over 600,000 student hours of education delivery, 10-12% improvement in attendance and a 19% increase in the performance of nine schools across three districts of the state of Karnataka. Healthcare services have been delivered via twenty centers, across eight districts in three states (Karnataka, Rajasthan and Madhya Pradesh), resulting in over 50,000 patient consultations, with hundreds of treatments for malnourished children and consultations with expectant mothers.

India Broadband Stats

In 2011, India adopted the National Optical Fiber Network policy. However, India ranks a distant 122^ndworldwide in Fixed Broadband Penetration per 100 residents.

Shamefully, third world countries like Tonga and Kyrgyzstan are ahead of us. India also ranks a far-off 106^th in the Mobile Broadband Penetration across the world per 100 residents.

Thankfully, in the percentage of households with Internet for developing countries, India ranks better at 75.

But again, in Percentage of Individuals using the Internet across the world, India is at 145 and among developing countries is at 98.

The report says that as India is one of the first countries to launch LTE (4G telephony), it will accelerate service delivery in sectors ranging from health to public infrastructure, and thus drive a significant structural shift in consumer behaviour over the next few years, especially given that nearly 200 operators in 75 countries may offer LTE services by the end of 2013.

Hopefully, the scenario improves in next couple of years!

Fairfax Financials Offers BlackBerry Acquisition For USD 4.7 Billion, Has 6 Weeks To Find Alternative Buyer

The inevitable has happened – Blackberry has been acquired it’s Toronto based largest shareholder Fairfax Financial Holdings. The deal is subject to proper due-diligence and various clearances.

Fairfax Holding is pre-dominantly an insurance and investment business based in Toronto and owned by Prem Watsa. They were Blackberry’s largest shareholders with 10 percent stake in the company. The deal valued at USD 4.7 billion will give it’s shareholder a value of USD 9 per share. Blackberry shares have been trading between USD 9 to USD 10 for last 3 months!

According to the agreement, Blackberry has a window of 6 weeks to look for an alternative buyer (if any) who can offer a better deal. If that comes along, Blackberry can accept the alternative offer by paying a termination fee.

While Blackberry is currently publicly traded, upon acquisition, Fairfax will offer USD 9 in cash per share to acquire remaining 90 percent of Blackberry shares in the market. You can check out more details offinancial transaction here.

Our Take

Blackberry’s acquisition was on cards – It was bound to happen and given the way Blackberry’s fortunes are going down, this is not really a bad deal either for the company or their share-holders. Compared to Nokia’s acquisition by Microsoft, Blackberry surely has got a sweet deal (though Nokia’s deal was more of a strategic one).

Having said that, I would not be surprised if likes of Samsung or Sony or Dell or Lenovo or someone else may come forward in this six weeks window to acquire Blackberry. These companies will surely find lot more value in Blackberry compared to what Fairfax may.

Barbara Stymies, Chairman of BlackBerry’s board of directors has clearly stated that “Importantly, the go-shop process provides an opportunity to determine if there are alternatives superior to the present proposal from the Fairfax consortium,”.

Blackberry currently has over USD 1 Billion worth of Unsold Phone inventory primarily due to Blackberry Z10’s failure to woos consumers.

Like I said, I see a strong chance that BlackBerry will interest many other buyers especially who want to make further inroads into mobile smartphone hw/sw space that is right now being led by Android and iOS’s of the world!

What’s your take?

Fake BBM Apps Fool Thousands Of Android Users!

Today is 21^st September and like me, hordes of Android users are waiting for Blackberry Messenger to arrive on Play store. Social Media sites are abuzz with talks of BBM downloads. Like many others, I visited play store to check BBM’s arrival. To my excitement, I had “Blackberry Messenger” by “BBM Inc.” staring right back at me. Without giving much thought about it, I went ahead and installed.

Generally, when I install any app, I make sure I read the reviews properly, to make sure that the app is genuine and works properly. This time though in the excitement, I did not do it. And like many others I fell into the trap. Here check the screenshot from Google Play store of the app I am talking about.

Though I knew that there are many “Blackberry” Apps created by third parties, the name of developer of this app “BBM Inc” was what convinced me to download it.

When I tried opening the app, it crashed on my Nexus. I tried it a few times but same thing happened. I have installed hundreds of apps on phone, but I have never had a app that did not even start. I was a little surprised. But after I read the reviews from users and spoke to a few people on Facebook and Twitter, it became clear that I was caught in the FAKE-APP trap.

Literally every reviewer had the same experience of app crashing on them. After doing little bit of research on the developer name “BBM Inc”, it was clear that the App was not only fake, but may also be a malware, that could potentially harm your mobile.

The app developer had not one but 3-4 different apps for “Blackberry messenger” and also some other games to their name. The description used for the app was not something Blackberry will use for their apps!

The Real Blackberry Messenger App On Android

The real BBM app will be arriving at 4:30pm India time on Play Store. The app may be released under the name of “RIM”, “Research In Motion” or “Blackberry”. Also, make sure read the description where it may say that “this is official BBM app for Android”. In addition read the user reviews of the app to see what they have to say about it. If the reviews are positive, that means people have used it and vetted the authenticity of the app!

Setting Up Chromecast In India – A User Review

Today I received my ChromeCast Device (One my friend in US sent it for me), it’s not yet available in India for purchase. ChromeCast is Google’s cheaper alternative to streaming devices like Apple TV (I have been using Apple TV for past 2 years) and Roku (and other such devices).

It has similar capabilities like AirPlay (available on MAC and iOS devices) but has a restriction of Chrome Browser and/or ChromeCast compatible Apps (Which are Youtube, Netflix, Google Music, Google Play TV and Movies). Unlike AirPlay you cannot use it as a pure screen casting option.

Box

Here is what was in Chromecast Box

The box consists of –

1. ChromeCast Stick (Device)
2. USB Cable
3. Charger
4. HDMI extender (Extension to connect ChromeCast Device to Television’s HDMI Slot)
5. Product Manual

Setting Up Chromecast

I must say I was impressed how easy it was to set it up. It is a simple 3-step process -

1. Connect your ChromeCast device to your television – You can connect it in two ways

• (Preferred) Attach ChromeCast HDMI adapter to device and put it in your Television’s HDMI Slot and also attach USB cable and put it in your Television’s USB port (for powering ChromeCast device).
• Attach ChromeCast HDMI adapter to device and put it in your Television’s HDMI Slot and attach charger cable to device and plug it in for powering the device.

2. Power on and change the Television mode to HDMI slot where ChromeCast device is plugged in, you should see following screen

3. Download ChromeCast app from https://cast.google.com/chromecast/setup on your desktop/mac to complete the setup. Follow steps (WiFi configuration and Naming the device) mentioned in the app and complete the setup.

That’s it you are all set to enjoy (?) ChromeCast !

Once you are done with the complete setup you will see following screen on your Television.

Start ChromeCasting

Install this Google Cast AddOn on your Desktop Chrome Browser and you will see Casting Button on top right corner of your Chrome Browser and on the bottom right corner on your Youtube Videos.

And when you press the ChromeCast option the video magically appears on your Television!

ChromeCast from iPhone

Also now if you go to your iPhone and open latest YouTube App you will see ChromeCast option on the top right corner of the video, click choose the ChromeCast device and start casting -

And this is how you will see this on Television

You can also cast browser tab to your TV (maybe to view photos or something like that). I didn’t find that much useful.

Behind the scene

ChromeCast doesn’t actually do streaming, instead the device allows you to control the content streaming from your PC/Mac/Mobile Device. What really happens is when you ChromeCast any Youtube video in Chrome/Youtube app and choose to ChromeCast, it actually instructs ChromeCast device what video to play from internet and it streams that from cloud. This way your Phone is free (you can actually turn it off also once stream is started on your Television) This is pretty cool but currently only works with Youtube and Netflix.

Pros:

1. Cheap (35$)
2. Easy to setup (Plug and Play pretty much)
3. Cross Platform (Windows, Mac, Android, iOS)
4. Portable (very small, can hide behind your TV)
5. Browser Tab Casting

Cons:

1. Biggest issue I see is with resolution (as expected) – I can only see 1080 p HD videos on my LED Television, all other lower resolutions give very poor output on Television. When I used Chrome Browser to play some local videos and ChromeCasted them onto TV it slowed down my MAC a bit (it’s definitely resource intensive) also the quality is more closer to good old VHS days.

2. Only Youtube app is supported in India (as we don’t have Netflix). Need more apps. (I would love to see Coursera or similar E-Learning apps with ChromeCast capabilities)

3. Currently only supports Chrome Browser for Tab Casting

Final Thoughts

In short -

Overall it’s a good bargain for 35$ and I hope there would be many more apps coming soon with ChromeCast support.

Having said that, being in India we do not have too many apps that can currently work. I have not tried using proxy to trick chromecast in thinking that I have US, but I am sure that is a workaround that can be used to consumer US-Only apps in India!

The feature that makes ChromeCast unique is again you can continue using your phone for other activities after you initiate the cast as ChromeCast sources all the streaming from Internet.

[This guest post is written by our regular reader Vishwas Jirgale. He is a true gadget fan, mobility expert loves to play around with latest and greatest in gadgets and mobile technology. Currently he is Director of Product Engineering group focusing on Enterprise Mobile Products.]

Malware Becoming A Real Threat For Android Devices In India

With the advent of smartphones, the threats which computers used to face earlier are being passed down to smartphones as well. With the PC market shrinking and the tablets-smartphones growing by leaps and bounds every year, programmers are having a gala time exploiting loopholes. And users are bearing the brunt.

Android had and still has just one issue and that keeps on popping up its head every now and then…Malware. Last month the US Government had said that Android is a malware ‘magnet’, thanks to the OS fragmentation.

The reason was so many devices still run the outdated versions. Of the malicious attacks documented in the study issued by the Department of Homeland Security (DHS) and the Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI), 79 percent took place on an Android device. Meanwhile, Apple’s iOS received just 0.7 percent of the recorded malware threats.

The US report had said that 44 percent of Android users are still using versions 2.3.3 through 2.3.7-known as Gingerbread-which were released in 2011 and have a number of security vulnerabilities that were fixed in later versions.

Now the Computer Emergency Response Team-India (CeRT-In) has said a potentially damaging virus, which steals SMSes and personal details of an Android-enabled gadget-user, has been detected in Indian cyberspace.

The malware is affecting all the versions of Android prior to version 4.2.2 (Jelly Bean). The malicious programme, the advisory said, is so damaging that it could be used for stealing personal information like email addresses, IMEI numbers, SMSes and installed applications. “It could also send SMS or make calls from infected devices without user consent,” the sleuths of the national cyber security centre said.

Modus Operandi

Android Master key vulnerability – The vulnerability involves discrepancies in how Android applications are cryptographically verified & installed, allowing for APK code modification without breaking the cryptographic signature.

All Android applications contain cryptographic signatures, which Android uses to determine if the app is legitimate and to verify that the app hasn’t been tampered with or modified. This vulnerability makes it possible to change an application’s code without affecting the cryptographic signature of the application – essentially allowing a malicious author to trick Android into believing the app is unchanged even if it has been.

The worst part is, the attacker can craft the malicious file for stealing personal information. It could even send SMS or make calls from infected device WITHOUT user consent.

Counter Measures

Check for the permissions required by an application before installing, exercise caution while visiting untrusted sites for clicking links, run a full system scan through a device with a mobile security solution or mobile anti-virus solution or anti-malware software, do not download and install applications from untrusted sources and download applications only from trusted sources, reputed application markets and Google play store.

With Android coming up with newer versions, shouldn’t it join the mobile device manufacturers in providing upgrades to the older handsets – if not all, atleast the major devices using the older versions? Or should the manufacturers be allowed to sell devices with OS which is a sitting duck for hackers, especially when we know it is vulnerable?

Opera Partners with 7 Indian Smartphones Vendors To Increase Mobile Browser Market Share

                             Few people know Opera in the desktop space but it’s opposite when it comes to Opera on mobile. Most of the mobile users know it, and have also used it.

                               While it comes to the web, Opera is the fourth most popular browser (after Chrome, Firefox, IE/Safari depending on you OS), in the mobile world however, Opera seems to have been always there.

It was there in the pre-smartphone days, known for its data crunching that enabled user to get faster web page rendering. Because Opera used server-side, data reduction, users also had to download less data thus saving bandwidth.

                                In the smartphones as well, Opera had gained momentum as people downloaded it as their browser of choice because of their fondness that they had from the usage in feature phones. However, the Android browser (and later Chrome on mobile) was quite capable and thus Opera found itself fighting stiff battles. Then came along the plethora of browsers and suddenly mobile internet had the same competition as the desktop.

                              In fact, once India’s most used mobile browser, Opera was recently toppled by UC Browser which claims to be the number one 3rd party browser used by Indians with 30% market share. If you look at Statcounter analytics, in the month of June/July of this year, UC Browser overtook Opera as the Top mobile browse in India.

                               To tackle this, Opera has partnered with seven Indian smartphone vendors (Micromax, Videocon, Spice, MoMagic Technologies, Wynncom, Lemon Mobiles and iBall). According to the partnership agreement, Opera will be pre-loaded in the phones that will be launched by these companies. This is not the first tie-up of Opera and now it has such a partnership with 17 companies including Karbonn, Lava, Intex, HCL etc.

                                   This is indeed a huge number and as we know that Micromax is one of the biggest Indian vendors out there, Opera should be able to get a good reach because of this. Some of the phones that will be launching with Opera Mini in the near future are Micromax’s Canvas 4, Canvas Doodle 2, Spice’s Coolpad, Lava Iris 506Q, Celkon Campus A20, Karbonn A9 Star. Many other phones will also be launched in the future with opera Mini installed in them.

                                   Besides these, Opera has also tied up with Symphony Mobile in Bangladesh and Colors Mobile in Nepal to bring Opera Mini to these countries as well.

                                   According to Sunil Kamath, Opera Software Vice President for South Asia- “India is home to the largest number of Opera Mini users in the world. Partnering with local OEMs in India and neighboring countries is part of our growth strategy to take Opera Mini’s user numbers in the region from strength to strength.”

Let’s see if Opera is able to regain its lost ground with these partnerships.

MTV, Swipe launch VOLT, a 6 inch Phablet for Rs. 13k

Looks like no one can stay away from entering the Smartphone / Tablet space. Now, MTV has gone ahead and announced launch of “Swipe MTV VOLT” a 6 inch Phablet (Phone+tablet). The Phablet has been bought into the market by Swipe in Partnership with MTV.

Although it has not been clearly mentioned, it looks like Swipe will be handling manufacturing / procurement and inventory of this phablet, while MTV has lend its brand name, making it quite appealing to younger generation.

MTV, the youth brand of Viacom18, will undoubtedly bring more weightage to this phablet. Even according to Swipe Telecom, MTV VOLT is a ‘made to order’ product for the generation that’s constantly communicating, entertaining and socializing.

The unique feature of this phablet is an exclusive in-built TV player that will offer Volt tablet owners on the go access to MTV content. It is not clear how this MTV content will be offered, but if it is through 3G data access, it may not be appealing given the data transfer costs that users will incur.

MTV VOLT Specifications

MTV VOLT is light weighing only 239 grams – Most of 7 inch tablets are 300 grams and upwards. It comes with 1 GHz Dual Core processor (MTK 6577) and has a HD Capacitive 5 point Multi-Touch Display. Although the display is good, the resolution of this phablet is a modest 854 X 480.

As is the norm now for such tablets-phablets-smartphones, it comes with Dual-Sim and has a 4 GB internal memory expandable upto 32 GB using SD card. However, the most disappointing aspect of MTV VOLT is its RAM. At 512 mb, it will not be sufficient for resource hungry applications/games needed by today’s younger generation.

Running on Android 4.1 Jelly Bean, this phablet has a 8.1 MP rear camera with flash, a 1.3 MP front camera, FM with recording, G-Sensor and a decent 3200 mAh battery that should last a complete day at low to moderate usage. [See full specs here]

At Rs. 12,999/-, MTV VOLT should appeal to a section of young consumers who want to own a decent brand, but at the same time do not want to spend too much!

Software Suites need to go A-La-Carte…

There must be millions of softwares in the world. Some of these softwares are free or open source, on the other hand, some cost more than the computer they are supposed to run on. Some of them are made by individual programmers while others are made by large corporations and are more like commodities.

In these commodities, there are software systems that are called suites or Software Suites. These are a group of softwares that are in a similar field or serve similar purposes and are therefore companies tag them together for the people to buy them together.

The two best examples for this kind of suite are – Microsoft Office and Adobe Creative Suite.

The first one is an Office application with softwares that range from Word (for writing) to Powerpoint (Presentations) and from Excel (data crunching) to OneNote (notes). Adobe creative suite consists of softwares like Photoshop (Image manipulation), Flash Builder (Flash), Illustrator (Vector Graphics) and many more. Basically, there are softwares for all the creative pursuits, be it web designing, pictures or videos.

There are many other suites as well- LibreOffice, Seamonkey, Corel Graphic suite, Microsoft Visual Studio etc.

All these have a few things in common-

• There are versions from light to heavy with heaviest containing all the softwares.
• Most of them are bloated, especially the heaviest (or pro) one.
• Those which cost really have steep prices.

With the coming of cloud, the numbers of services that can be offered have increased and so has the option of downloading the software online. Microsoft even has started its own Office 365 which it is promoting even more than its original Office suite. Add to that the fact that the last iteration of both Windows and Mac OS were downloadable and relatively quite cheap and we know that the physical distribution is soon going to become obsolete.

Why I am bringing this is because there was another flaw of physical distribution system. The different kind of softwares that can be added in the suite (the less costly or the lighter versions) was to be decided by the software developing company. They could not give the option of choosing to the user without giving away the whole suite in the CD or DVD and locking the rest of the softwares (this was also done sometimes).

With the internet distribution channel, this is not a necessity anymore. Thus, I think there should not be package systems like they currently are.

All the softwares can be given an individual price and buying more than one can get the customer appropriate discounts. This way, if a person wants a particular combo he can get that without having to buy extra software. Think of it like TV paid channels, you can either buy a single channel or have a pre-fabricated combos or create your own combo.

After all let me ask you- “How many softwares from a software suite does a person actually use?”No one uses all of them.

More importantly, people barely use half of them. For example, I need only the student edition plus Outlook. There might be a person who uses InfoPath, Publisher and Powerpoint only. Yet again, there might be someone who uses some other combo.

Same can be said about any other suite as well. Not everybody manipulate photoshop and design web. Some might just like to create videos. Yet again, there might be someone who uses a completely different combination.

The two advantages of this to the customer are-

1. Prices go down. You pay for what you use.
2. Bloat reduces. System resources are less used as not the whole suite is installed.

For the company also, there are advantages. They can know which software is used less thus can be given less focus. The bandwidth will reduce that is used for downloading.

It might seem that the profits will reduce for the company as people will not buy the complete (and costliest) version. That is true. But the company can still price the individual softwares in a way that this impact is minimal. Also, once the company knows where to give maximum focus the resources used will reduce as well.

I think this is a win-win situation for both the parties. With internet distribution increases, this type of choice should become a norm among the companies.

HP Hotspot Printer Giveaway!

Trak.in readers now have a great opportunity to get HP Hotspot printer that we reviewed a few days back. You will have to simply tell us how HP Hotspot can be an asset to your office and you might just own one!

Over the next 4 weeks, selected 5 best entries will get a HP Hotspot printer each.

Participants need to:

Tell us how efficiently you can use HP Hotspot in your office and how it may help increase your productivity.

With HP Hotspot printer, apart from regular laser printing, copying, scanning and faxing, you can actually setup your entire small office network wirelessly within minutes. It can replace all your networking devices for upto 8 users, making it ideal for small offices, home offices and startups.

3 features that stand out for this printer are ePrint, Airprint and Hotspot/Direct print. These 3 features make it possible for the user to print not only from within their office wirelessly, but from any where in the world. It is as simple as sending an email to the printer (yes, each printer has its own unique email ID).

To know about more the product please read the detailed review here.

HP Hotspot Printer Giveaway

To participate, please follow these simple steps:

1) Read the review to know more about the HP Hotspot printer.

2) Leave a comment with your name (and Business / startup name), email ID and your feedback on the printer. (The comment has to be left on the this page itself)

3) The feedback comment should talk about how HP Hotspot printer can benefit your business.

See screenshot below

Please be as detailed as possible and all fields have to be filled in properly. Your comment has to be honest and truthful. If you do not like something about the printer or you want to see some more features on this printer, just let us know.

HP Hotspot Printer Giveaway Rules

1. The giveaway will be offered to the best feedback / comment received.
2. Incase of more than one “best” comments, we will do a lucky draw to find a single entry every week.
3. Best selected entry will be announced every Monday.
4. Trak.in has the sole discretion for choosing / rejecting the entries (Be rest assured we will be as fair as possible).
5. We will get in touch with shortlisted entries on email / phone to check the authenticity.

The Giveaway will run for a period of 4 weeks till 11^th March 2013.

During the first 3 weeks we will announce one best entry each. On 11th March, we will announce the final 2 best entries of the Hotspot.

Android Fragmentation – The real issue is security!

We have all heard about Android Fragmentation. This is neither a myth nor as big a deal as made out. Basically, because of its open nature, the handset makers are free to upgrade the OS on the phones as per their convenience. [Current Android distribution percentages]

In contrast to that, as soon as a new version of iOS comes in the market, every iPhone in the market gets updated to it. Mind you, these iPhones (be it 4, 4S or 5) are the ones that Apple is currently selling. The support extends only so far.

All iOS updates are not the same as well. For example, iPhone 4 did not get Siri though it was updated to iOS 5. This might at first look feel like the update itself is useless if it does not give you the best thing about the OS. In many ways, it can itself be considered a fragmentation of the OS itself. Only the naming convention is kept but each phone is getting a different OS.

In this way, fragmentation is present in Apple too. There are two major differences though-

1. All the supported phones (by Apple) do get the latest iOS.
2. The time lapse between the release of OS and its update on the phone is less.

How does this change situation you might ask. Well, for first, an OS is not just the a few cool features that weren’t present earlier. In fact, most of the time, it is under the hood features that are more important.

For example, Windows Vista was worse than WinXP in a lot of ways. It was slower and what not. Despite this, it was definitely more secure than WinXP (which in turn was better than Win95 or 98). This is true for Mobile OS as well.

Now, a phone might not be able to run 60 fps that are up for offer in Jelly Beans but if the phone is in the market and is supposedly still supported, then it should at least get all the security features of the latest OS. Once, a new OS is launched, even with best efforts only patches can be delivered for the old OS.

In the (Android) mobile world, this issue is twice as bad. As the version 4.2 is in the market, it is quite difficult to maintain a 2.3 (Gingerbread). Ironically, it is the current most used OS. Worse, some cheap phones that are even launched recently have this on their phones. Security is a major issue in such cases.

With mobiles becoming the go to device for everything, they practically hold all the information about a person. In many ways, a mobile is a more powerful device to get hold of than a man’s computer. In such a situation, it is very important to have the phone updated to every security measure possible and not just a few patches here or there.

Also, the phones that can be upgraded should get the update as fast as possible. Preferably, Google should work with the OEMs so that the testing occurs before the OS is launched. At least the flagships deserve a better response time. The launch of Android 5.0 is around the corner and many phones are still not on 4.1 let alone 4.2.

Cool features aside, the true reason for quick update to latest OS should be security. UI is important but with the amount of sensitive information a phone holds, mobiles should get the best possible security, be it any OS version.

Indian Government’s IT Spending pegged at Rs. 36,800 Cr in 2013 [Report]

Indian Government’s IT spending is estimated to be Rs. 36,800 crore in 2013 according to a forecast by research and advisory firm Gartner. Telecommunications will be the largest expenditure category while software will see highest growth in government spending.

Government of India’s UID program is seen as a key driver of increase in expenditure. Direct cash transfersand a revamped welfare system are some of the ambitious goals of the UID program.

The UIDAI portal reveals that nearly 27.5 crore or 275 million AADHAARs have been issued across India. After achieving 200 million enrolments in February last year, the government reportedly allowed authorities to approve the enrolment of a further 400 million.

Implementing and issuing AADHAAR numbers across a user base of 600 million Indians will presumably drain a significant sum out of the government coffers. Ram Sewak Sharma, Director General, UIDAI, said last year that the total cost of the project may be Rs. 18,000 crore.

“India goes to the national polls in 2014, and the GoI will aim to expand the UID operational infrastructure by speed tracking ‘financial inclusion’, allowing easy access to banking for poor & encouraging micro ATMs” said Anurag Gupta, Research Director, Gartner.

The Rs. 20,000 crore National Fibre Optic Network (NFON), electronic chip making and digitization of databases are also seen by Gartner as factors which will drive government spending and benefit the Indian IT sector.

In October last year, the Union Cabinet approved the National Electronics Policy which envisaged the incubation of a $400 billion Electronic System Design and Manufacturing (ESDM) sector in India by 2020. Large scale indigenous chip making facilities was one of focus points of the policy.

Apart from the highlighted government initiatives in the Gartner report, there are other programs that are set to increase penetration of IT in everyday governance. “In the second generation revolution what we are doing is transforming governance, education, health and many other things with the use of internet and web” said Sam Pitroda, adviser to the PM in September 2013. The ‘second generation revolution’ will reportedly see the government spending over Rs. 1 lakh crore.

Gartner expects government spending on desktop and infrastructure software to drive a strong rate of growth in expenditure in the software category. Telecommunications, the largest driver of the 10.5% forecast increase in IT expenditure will include government spending on telecom/networking equipment and related services.

Information and technology is seen by commentators as a vital anchor point for India’s growth story. Commentators are hoping that expectations of increased expenditure in IT will eventually be backed by efficient implementation for delivery of better governance to the common man.

HP Hotspot Printer: Setup a fully Wireless Office in Minutes!

Recently, I installed a HP wireless All-in-One printer at my Home Office primarily for my wireless printing and scanning needs. However, having used it for over a week now, I can say that this newly launched HP Hotspot Laserjet pro M1218nfs MFP turned out to be much more than what I had expected.

HP Hotspot is first printer in the world to have hotspot and networking features built into it, making it an ideal all-in-one router/printing/scanning/networking/copying/faxing device for any small office environment. Infact, I can go to an extent to say that this will probably be the only device that may be required by startups or Individuals who are newly setting up their office.

The most impressive feature for me has to be the HP ePrint service. The HP Hotspot Laserjet pro M1218nfs MFP printer is ePrint enabled, which means you can print to the printer from virtually anywhere in the world by simply sending an email. Lets look at these features in little more detail

Features of HP Hotspot Laserjet pro M1218nfs

The printer obviously has all the traditional features that a LaserJet printer should have, including 18 ppm printing, document copying, scanning and also Fax (I doubt anyone uses it now). But the 3 other features – Wireless Hotspot, Airprint and HP ePrint – are something that are really useful especially for startups.

Wireless Hotspot & Direct Print

As the name suggests, the printer acts as a hotspot. Just plug the internet cable (RJ 45) in the provided port and you are ready to go. At initial setup you will just need to go through a simple setup process and install the driver, and you are nearly done. HP Smart Install automatically installs printer within minutes, without the need for CD installation. The HP Hotspot printer allows upto 8 wireless user connection making it an ideal networking setup for a home or small office.

Any of the hotspot connected devices can also directly print to the printer without any hassle.

Airprint

Airprint is more useful to iPhone and iPad users – where the iOS based devices can directly print anything on from their devices directly to the printer (without installing any software). Airprint is basically a feature implemented by Apple on their recent iOS versions for printing requirements on wireless LAN. See the video below regarding more details on Airprint.

Hp ePrint

Like I mentioned before, this undoubtedly is my favourite feature and I am sure to use it quite frequently. ePrint allows anyone across the world to print to your printer just by sending an email.

Every ePrint enabled printer has a unique email address attached to it (which you can even customize after creating an account on ePrint website). A user who needs to print a document, image or anything else has to send it as an email attachment to that specific email address. Once the email is sent, generally within about 10 to 15 seconds the printer will out all the documents that have been sent to printer.

Imagine, how easy it will now be to get anything printed from anywhere. Know more about ePrint on their official page.

The goodies don’t stop there – and this is especially useful for people who are Google Docs users. The ePrint enabled printers can directly print from Google docs using the Google Cloud print platform.

Pricing

There is no doubt that HP Hotspot Laserjet pro M1218nfs is one of the most complete printers I have come across. It can probably print anything from any device from any place. However, in my view, even with all these features, a retail price tag of Rs. 18,306/-, is higher than what I would have liked.

Notwithstanding the slightly higher price, I would recommend this printer to all startups and small businesses who are looking at a building an efficient, smart and connected office!

With Quad-core mobiles under 15K, What will the Biggies do?

You must have read the recent announcement from Micromax. They will launch a quad-core phone this February in the price bracket of 15K. You can read more details on the Micromax A116 canvas mobile, we published earlier. I am not going to repeat the specs here. They are as good as any phone above 20K have in the market and the quad core. Well, this baby was till now available in the 30K range only.

With this phone Micromax is not only challenging the big guns, it is changing the whole smartphone picture. Recently, I wrote an article about what new things will come in the smart phone market. Till then, there was always an option that the quad-core phones will become cheaper. I expected this to happen soon, but in all honesty, not this quickly.

This means that other companies will have to bring down the cost of their smartphones or bring the quad core in the 20K range if they want to fight Micromax.

Now, being an Indian company, Micromax will not command the same kind of elite aura that is associated with Sony, Samsung or HTC. Heck! Sony is even thinking about leaving the whole cheap smartphone arena to focus on the high-end phones. Even with all this, we have seen Micromax’ Canvas series phones selling like hot-cakes because they are such value for money. Now, this phone beats even its old predecessors.

How is current Smartphone Market placed in India

Let us look at the current market for a second. Samsung has its best phones with Quad core and anything below 30K is having a dual core. Same is the case with HTC.

HTC has yet to launch its 5” phone in the Indian market (Micromax Canvas A116 HD is 5”).Sony’s first 5” and quad core phone Xperia Z is just out and has similar specs as A116 (except the camera). Also, there is still time for it to be launched in India. Windows phones are still sporting Dual-cores…no quad-cores there yet!

This pretty much clears the fact that A116 is a high end phone without the “high end” price tag. Add the price tag and the competition it actually has (the lower end phones of high end companies) and there is no competition of any kind. It has a stock Android Jelly Bean 4.1 (upgradeable to 4.2) which is being praised and thus has no need of any skin.

What will the biggies do?

The question is- What do the rest of the companies do? They cannot launch the 4 cores in the midrange yet. That is their next upgrade and cash cow.

They can of course hope that because of its screen size and name many people will leave it even with its worth. They can reduce the current price of their phones. These things though are temporary solutions and also remember- Micromax is planning to launch nearly 30 phones in next 12 months, and it is quite possible that half of them would be high-end smartphones. If they have already reached a quad core, imagine what their next high-end phone will have!

Thus unless the phone has some glaring defect, it has the potential to turn hardcore fans of other companies to at least test this one out. Of course, unless you are not interested in the 5” screen!

One thing I can say with surety though – The Rs. 40k price-point will now become more of a Rs. 30k price point. What I mean is the top-of-the-line phones were generally commanding prices closer to 40k. With Micromax launching A116 canvas at Rs. 15k, I doubt anyone will not even think of buying a Rs. 40k phone. That price point will now be 30k. We will increasingly see high-end phones coming in bracket lesser than Rs. 30k.

Micromax A116 Canvas HD: A quad-core phone under 15k?

Micromax has just announced launch of its latest superphone – the Micromax A116 Canvas HD. According to news reports, this phone has a quad-core processor with a price tag of less than Rs. 15,000/-!

That is really a big deal, and something that will probably create lot of problems to Samsung, HTC and likes. Similar specification phones from them are nearly double the price range.

The Micromax A116 Canvas HD is expected to launch in the first week of February!

Micromax A116 Canvas HD Specifications

• 1.2 GHz Quad Core Processor (Mediatek MT6589 quad core processor)
• 1 GB RAM
• 5 ” Full HD Display
• Screen resolution of 1280 x 720
• 16 million colour IPS Display
• Android 4.1 Jelly Bean
• 2100 mAH Battery

Micromax’s 2 recent canvas series super phones, the A100 and A110 have been a huge success and have been flying off-the-shelf. The reason is plain and simple.

Higher specification at lowest costs.

The A110 was the first 5 inch phone that came in with a dual-core processor and 5 inch IPS display and that too around Rs. 10k range which made it possible for masses to jump the smartphone bandwagon without burning their pockets.

Now with launch of Micromax A116 Canvas HD, they are going one step ahead and taking on the super-high end phones. Except for Nexus 4, which is currently not available in Indian market, all other quad core phones are above Rs. 30,000 price range.

Getting same specifications for less than half the price is mouth-watering to say the least.

With A116, many consumers may even ditch their existing phones to experience the quad-core power on a smartphone.

We will update readers with further details as they arrive!

Aadhar Poll: Have you applied yet? If not, why?

This question has been on my mind for past few months – How many citizens, especially urbanites, have applied for Aadhar card as yet?I have been having discussions about Aadhar card with many people in past few weeks and I have met more people who have not even applied for a Aadhar card as yet. And, few who have applied for it, have not received it as yet. I have not come across a single person who has actually received Aadhar card.

According to news reports that have come out close to 300 million (or about 25 percent of population) people have been issued Aadhar cards. In states like Andhra Pradesh, Kerala and Himachal Pradesh over 60 percent of population have already been issued with Aadhar cards [source].

Delhi has maximum number of issuance with 75 percent already having it (It is probably because the concentration of Govt. employees in Delhi is highest). The fact is, with direct cash transfers being implemented from January 2013, most of the Government Employees have been forced to apply for it.

It is clear that people from rural areas and Govt. employees will go for it… But what about the urban population. Are they also making a beeline to Aadhar centers ?

That’s exactly the purpose of this poll – To find out how many urban citizens have applied for Aadhar card, and if not, what is the reason they have not applied it.

While, the sample size may be very small for this poll, it will probably give us a broad idea about what urban citizen thought-process is about the Aadhar cards.