State of Telecom Industry in Pakistan

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Nokia Life tools launched in India

Published by Basit Ali on June 15, 2009 under Mobile Applications, Mobile Content,Nokia

A cross post from Basit’s Blog

Nokia life tools

have been running as a pilot in Indian state of Maharashtra.Nokia has announced the commercial launch of these tools in Maharashtra today. This service will run in this state for now and will spread further to the other parts of the country later. Life-tools is a combination of entertainment, information, education and agriculture services in the emerging markets.

The idea is to have applications running on common, low cost phones that is owned by the greater number of users in small towns and remote areas and the focus of the applications is to make the life of the users easier one way or another.

Here are a few shots from the agriculture related application. You can have more information about these applications here.

The biggest challenge in such cases is to bring information and updates to the users from the very local market and the changes should reflect the happenings around them, for example market prices, weather, irrigation related details etc.

That is why the service has been launched in a limited area, and will grow over time. Nokia has recently been concentrating on these so-called emerging markets like India and Pakistan where the telecom market has been growing exponentially resulting in very high sales of handsets.

Nokia N97 - Launched

Published by Arsalan Mir on June 13, 2009 under 3G, Mobile Phones, Nokia,Telecommunications

A while back we took a sneak peak at Nokia’s latest offering, N97. The set was officially launched on 12th June at a grand launch ceremony held at Marriott Karachi. Along with a tilting 3.5″ touch display, QWERTY keyboard and a fully customizable home screen, the Nokia N97 promises to offer instant access to the full range of Ovi services. The N97 is expected to be sold in Pakistan at a retail price of PKR 58,000 only.

The device was announced at a glamorous press event where two European models brought the phone at the venue and the Finnish First Secretary, Deputy Head of Mission H.E Miia Rainne handed over the phone to the GM Nokia Pakistan Imran Khalid Mahmood. Also present at the ceremony was Henri Mattila, Head of Category Marketing, Nseries Middle East and Africa.

Delivering on Nokia’s vision and thought leadership based on mobile convergence, Nokia Nseries has aimed to present the best in class mobile computers to its internet savvy consumers. Today, we take great pride in introducing the newest addition to Nokia Nseries – Nokia N97. We have combined the most-advanced smartphone capabilities in this device to enhance the internet entertainment for our consumers and at the same time ease-of use with one-touch access to their favourite online content.

Imran Khalid Mahmood

GM Nokia Pakistan

The Nokia N97 is Nokia’s first device to feature a personalizable home screen, which can be customized with a range of widgets which bring live information directly to the device. These widgets include key social networking destinations like Facebook and Hi5, news services like the Associated Press, Bloomberg and Reuters, as well as shopping and weather information.

The Nokia N97 is the first device to ship with the Ovi Store, which offers easy access to applications, games, videos, podcasts, productivity tools, web and location-based services, and much more. Ovi Store has paid and free content from a range of global and local content providers and developers, including Paramount Pictures, Facebook and Qik, as well as a selection of Twitter applications.

The Nokia N97 is an important step towards our vision of delivering a highly personalized Internet experience. Fuelled by a multitude of music, maps, games, media and applications via Ovi, the Nokia N97 transforms the Internet into an experience that’s completely tailored to the tastes and interests of its owner.

Henri Mattila

Head of Category Marketing

Nseries Middle East and Africa

Entertainment Ensured

The Nokia N97 also has direct access to the huge catalogue of music in the Nokia Music Store. With multiple high-speed connectivity options and 32GB of storage (up to 48GB using a microSD card) it is possible to directly download and store tens of thousands of songs on the handset. And you can listen to your favourite music on the Nokia Bluetooth Stereo Headset BH-905, which Nokia also launched today. This headset brings crystal clear sound, eliminates background noise, and is the ideal accessory for listening to music and making calls on the Nokia N97, as well as being compatible with a diverse range of other mobile and music devices.

High-quality images and video clips at 30 frames per second (fps) can be captured using the 5 megapixel camera with integrated Carl Zeiss optics. Images can also be geo-tagged to specific locations and shared instantly with friends or uploaded online via Ovi Share, Twitter or Flickr.

Google Mobile App for S60 - Quick Access to Google Services

Published by Babar Bhatti on June 13, 2009 under Google, Mobile Phones, Nokia,Telecommunications

Google recently announced the release of Google Mobile App for S60 (3rd Edition), which allows quick access to Google search and offers shortcuts to a number of Google’s other services. Features include a homescreen shortcut and automatic location context, via GPS or cell positioning, for searches. Incidentally Google’s S60 YouTube application was also silently updated to version 2.0.17. Read on for more details.

Note: Thanks to Saleem Khan for sharing this useful link.

Google Mobile App for S60

Google Mobile App for S60 is, effectively, an update from and an extension to the Google S60 Search application announced last year.

The homescreen shortcut uses either ‘c’ key or the ‘pencil’ key depending on which device you are using. There’s an optional prompt that pops up a reminder of the shortcut (see first screenshot - it used just be the pencil key on supported devices), but this can be turned off if you wish.

Above is an example of a basic Google search for ‘pub’. With ‘My Location’ enabled an appropriate set of local results is offered automatically. The My Location feature ties in with and uses ‘My Location’ from Google Maps (Latitude). Either the device’s GPS or cell-positioning can be used to obtain current location information.

Read more »

N97 Sneak-Peak

Published by Arsalan Mir on May 25, 2009 under 3G, Competitive Trends, Consumer Rights, Digital Convergence, EDGE, Emerging Markets Telecom, Gadgets, HSDPA,Mobile Phones, Mobile Trends, Nokia, Pakistan, Personal Navigation Devices,Telecommunications, blogging

Like I had mentioned in my previous post, the Nokia Bloggers Meet-up was held on 22nd May at The Sports Bar - Karachi. The event wasn’t just a bloggers meet-up but also a sneak-peak of N97.

N97- The new entrant in the Nokia’s flagship N-series is due to launch in Pakistan in first week of June. This time Nokia came different and thus was this pre-launch meet-up with the bloggers.

Mr. Adeel Hashmi, Communication Manager - Nokia Pakistan, started off the event giving an introduction to the idea of meeting the bloggers for the pre-launch and promised more of such meet-ups. The keynote speakers of the evening were Mr. Khurram Pradhan, Product and Portfolio Manager and Ms. Shabana Shahzad, Program Manager.

Khurram Pradhan gave his presentation on the main theme of N97 - Personal Internet. In his presentation he also focused on what’s driving the transformation of converged devices. He discussed that Nokia has been working on converging mobile phone with internet from last decade to enhance the personal internet experience.

At present out of the 1.3 billion internet users 520 million use it on mobile device and research has indicated this figure will go up to 1.5 billion by the year 2012. Nokia being consumer centric is on the move to make the mobile broadband dream a reality.

Not only this Nokia also plans to attract the market where we have 93 million users using the social network services like facebook, my space and twitter on their mobile devices, 82 million downloading maps on their devices, 22.3 million access the internet on devices daily for news and information and where we also have 184 million blogs among which 77% are actively read and commented. In efforts of enriching the networking experience, the N97 comes with third party widgets, which are standalone programs on your mobile home screen.

Nokia’s customer care is a two dimensional strategy, one, devices for connecting people and second devices for connecting places which it achieves along with Ovi Maps.

Foreseeing the future in application development Nokia has acquired all of the rights to the Symbian operating system (OS) and open sourced it under the Eclipse license.

Khurram’s part ended with a Q and A session and then came the most interesting and most awaited SNEAK PEAK at the N97. Ms. Shabana Shahzad conducted it. Bloggers were also given the feel-it experience of N97.

Some of the N97 features are:

- Easy and fast connections to internet services - Easy text input with QWERTY keyboard and touch screen - 3.5 inch sliding tilt display - Live personalized home screen with widgets - Up-to-date information via RSS feed - Fully compatible with Oviservices - Browse real web pages - Take pictures and videos and share them immediately - Watch high-quality video on the large 3.5 inch 16:9 widescreen - Video playback at 30 fps, for a wide array of formats - Play videos, music and pictures on TV using TV-out - Access internet video feeds through Nokia Video Center - Enjoy great audio through standard 3.5 mm jack headphones, built-in stereo speakers or Bluetooth technology - Digital music player with support for play list editing, equalizer and categorized access to your music collection - Search, browse and purchase songs online in Nokia Music Store (for availability, please visit www.music.nokia.com) - Nokia Maps with integrated compass and A-GPS receiver - Multimedia city guides and navigation services. Drive: voice guided car navigation, or Walk: pedestrian-optimized turn-by-turn guidance. (Navigation may need to be purchased separately.) - World-class game titles with N-Gage - Make you home-screen private any time you want

N97 Tech Profile:

System: WCDMA 900/1900/2100 (HSDPA), EGSM 850/900/1800/1900 MHz User Interface: S60 5th Edition Dimensions: 117.2 x 55.3 x 15.9 mm*mm (L x W x H) *18.25 mm at camera area Weight: Approx. 150 g Display: 3.5 inch TFT with up to 16 million colorsnHD16:9 widescreen (640×360 pixels) Battery: Nokia Battery BP-4L, 1500 mAh Memory: Up to 48GB (32 GB on-board memory, plus 16GB expansion via micro SD memory card slot) Video playback: MPEG-4 / SP and MPEG-4 AVC/H.264,up to 30 fps, up to VGA resolution Real Video up to QCIF @ 30 fps Windows Media (WMV9) up to CIF @ 30 fps Flash Lite 3.0 / Flash Video in internet browser Music playback: MP3, AAC, eAAC, eAAC+, WMA Lens: Carl Zeiss Tessar™ Image capture: Up to 5 mega pixels (2584 x 1938) JPEG/EXIF (16.7 million/24-bit color) Video capture: MPEG-4 VGA (640 x 480) at up to 30 fps Aperture: F2.8 Focal length: 5.4 mm Flash: Dual LED camera flash and video light Talk time: Up to 320 min (3G), 400 min (GSM) Standby time: Up to 400 hrs (3G), 430 hrs (GSM) Video playback: Up to 4,5 hours (offline mode) Music playback: Up to 37 hours (offline mode)

The device shall be availabe here in second week of june at an expected retail price of Rs. 60,000.

The Fourth Screen

Published by Arsalan Mir on May 23, 2009 under Mobile Phones, Nokia,Telecommunications

At the Nokia Blogger Meet-Up yesterday, Mr. Khurram Pradhan, Portfolio and Product Manager (Nokia Pakistan) shared this video in his presentation.

This video shows the transformation from the silver screen to the FOURTH SCREEN as he says is all about the paradigm shift. Soon cell phones will no longer be ‘cell phones’. Personal computing is transforming to mobile computing which will make your internet personal.

The device from Nokia that does it all -the N97- will launch in Pakistan next month. Stay tuned to get its sneak peak before its actual launch.

Making of Nokia N97

Published by Arsalan Mir on May 15, 2009 under Mobile Phones, Nokia, Pakistan

The story behind the making of the Nokia N97 is a fascinating one that gives a real insight of what goes into to forging a flagship device from scratch.

The team behind the creation of the Nokia N97 is a global one with a shared vision that’s highlighted in this video. The project is based in Tokyo, with the industrial designer in Finland, the mechanics team in Tokyo, and software teams around the globe, straddling Boston, Dallas, India, China, Singapore. Many of the key players at Nokia behind the product step in front of the lens in this rare video to tell their piece of the story puzzle that fits together to make the N97, including Tomi Kuparinen, Product Program Manager and designer Shunjiro Eguchi.

Watch the video below for the making of Nokia N97. The device launch in Pakistan shall be in the 3rd week of June. We shall get more on it to you soon.

Nokia E75 In Pakistan - BlackBerry Competitor?

Published by Babar Bhatti on May 9, 2009 under BlackBerry, Mobile Applications,Mobile Phones, Mobile Web, Nokia

Nokia has been paying special attention to email, media and ease of use. The E series of phones reflect this. Nokia announced that E75 will soon arrive in stores, bringing the company’s best efficiency and productivity solution to the Pakistani market.

The new arrival is the first device to ship with the new email user interface, offering full desktop email functionality, and complete integration of Nokia’s email and messaging services. It is clear that Nokia is directly competing with Blackberry for push email. Blackberry is quite popular in Pakistan already. It will be interesting to see how this competition plays out. As described in the PR, Nokia Messaging allows users to download and read attachments, and attach files to emails directly on the Nokia device.

Nokia E75 has a slide out QWERTY keyboard and efficient three-step email setup. This simplicity is achieved with the integration of Nokia Messaging, which ships with a device for the first time in the Nokia E75. Nokia Messaging is a service that opens up the world’s leading consumer email accounts - including Yahoo! Mail, Gmail and Windows Live Hotmail - and is joined by Nokia’s corporate email clients, Mail for Exchange and IBM Lotus Notes Traveler, which provide direct access to over 90 percent of the world’s corporate inboxes as well.

Calling All Innovators Contest By Nokia

Published by Babar Bhatti on April 30, 2009 under Competitive Trends, Emerging Markets Telecom, Entrepreneurship, ICT, Mobile Applications, Mobile Phones, Nokia,Telecommunications

Nokia is asking for submissions to the mobile applications innovation contest. The winner will get US$30,000, second place $15,000 and third place $10,000. This is appropriate, given the last post on opportunities in the ICT sector.

Forum Nokia, Nokia’s global developer program, challenges mobile and web application developers worldwide to submit best-in-class applications for use on Nokia devices.

Here are the 3 categories -

• Internet innovation – Calling on web developers to transform consumer-focused ideas into real applications on Nokia devices using technologies that include Nokia Web Runtime, XHTML, CSS, Java Script, AJAX, widgets and other standards-based web technologies.
• Flash – Challenging creative developers and designers to build compelling applications that expand the capabilities and user benefits of Flash Lite on Nokia devices.
• Emerging Markets and Mobile Necessities – Urging developers to create innovative applications across mobile technology platforms – ranging from SMS through Series 40 and S60 device platforms. All applications will be considered, including those developed using Java, Python, or open source. f your submission in this category is specific to the “Emerging Markets” type of applications, it should work on Nokia Series 40 devices, such as the Nokia 2323 classic or the Nokia 2330 classic.

Detailed instructions here. See the rules for submission.

Nokia Care In Multan

Published by Babar Bhatti on April 24, 2009 under Customer service, ICT, Mobile Phones, Nokia

I wrote about the shift in Nokia’s focus towards Pakistan last year. I am glad to see that Nokia is continuing in the right direction. Providing service at the local level is one of the ways to gain insights into the needs of diverse markets and it is one of Nokia’s strengths. I wonder if LG and Samsung will do the same thing - it will be good for the local job market as more trained technicians get employment.

Nokia so far has launched 7 care centres in the major cities of Pakistan located in Karachi, Lahore, Rawalpindi, Islamabad, Faisalabad, Peshawar and now in Multan. Nokia Care will provide customers with the required help and assistance needed to ensure best performance of their Nokia devices & engage Nokia’s global concept of ‘Connecting People’ through these care centers.

Nokia Xpress 5800 - Pakistan Launch

Published by Arsalan Mir on April 16, 2009 under 3G, Nokia, Telecommunications

The device is the latest offering in the XpressMusic series with the touch feature for the first time. It was launched here is Pakistan on 1st April 2009. Nokia got associated with music with the first music device in 2003 and XpressMusic has become part of youth’s life all around the world.

Pakistan has a 32.9% population between the age of 15 and 35 for whom music is the single most wanted entertainment. Nokia XpressMusic series is all about the youth and music lovers and 5800 is the most hip and easy to use device with optimized music performance. Nokia Pakistan will continue to enhance the music experience on the devices and enable consumers to listen to the music they want anywhere anytime. Afzal Shahabuddin, Director Marketing Nokia Pakistan.

When it comes to music phones, people all over the world want a device that is a great music experience – more memory, loud and powerful speakers, and easy synchronization – and must still work well as a mobile phone with direct access to important contacts and content. The Nokia 5800 XpressMusic delivers on the perfect combination of play, share and touch.

Device Features

Taking advantage of touch screen technology, the Nokia 5800 XpressMusic introduces the ‘Media Bar’, a handy drop down menu that provides direct access to music and entertainment, including favourite tracks, videos and photos. The Media Bar also offers a direct link to the web and to online sharing. Because the Nokia 5800 XpressMusic supports Flash content, individuals can surf the entire web, not just pieces of it. In addition, the Nokia 5800 XpressMusic offers all the music essentials, including a graphic equalizer, 8GB memory for up to 6000 tracks and support for all main digital music formats, and a 3.5mm jack. Built-in surround sound stereo speakers offer the industry’s most powerful sound.

Ensuring a seamless music experience, Nokia 5800 XpressMusic also provides easy access to browse and purchase tracks from the Nokia Music Store, this is not available in Pakistan at the moment. The newly updated Nokia Music PC software allows for easy drag-and-drop transfer of songs and management of any music collection.

The innovative ‘Contacts Bar’ lets consumers highlight four favorite contacts on their home-screen and, through a single touch, track a digital history of recent text messages, emails, phone logs, photos and blog updates.

With the Nokia 5800 XpressMusic, we set out to connect people through the one thing we all feel a universal connection to – music. The way in which people enjoy music is different around the world. With that in mind, the Nokia 5800 XpressMusic gives people the freedom to experience music they love in the way they prefer.

As Nokia’s first mass-market device with a touch screen, the Nokia 5800 XpressMusic turns a ‘user interface’ into a ‘human interface’ by truly putting people first. For example, we’ve introduced the Nokia Contacts Bar, which is like a digital RSS feed on your life. By adding the benefits of touch screen technology to S60, the world’s leading smart phone interface, Nokia is taking the familiar and giving it a human touch. We have used touch technology where it really adds value such as the Contacts Bar, Media Bar and clever shortcuts from the home screen to menu items such as calendar, profiles and clock.

Imran Khalid Mahmood,

Country General Manager Nokia Pakistan

For the best screen resolution available on a mobile phone, the 3.2” widescreen display brings photos, video clips and web content to life in vibrant color and true clarity. With a 16 by 9 aspect ratio and 30 frames-per-second playback and recording, the device is ideal for VGA quality video recording and playback.

The Nokia 5800 XpressMusic also features a 3.2 megapixel camera with Carl Zeiss lens and, with a single touch, images or videos can be shared via a favorite online community, such as Share on Ovi, Flickr, or Facebook. Music play list song titles can also be shared through Bluetooth, MMS or online sharing.

Mobile Payment Services Are Surging In Developing Countries

Published by Babar Bhatti on April 3, 2009 under Business, Consumer Rights, Digital Convergence, Economy, Emerging Markets Telecom, ICT, Internet, M-Commerce,Mobile Applications, Mobile Content, Mobile Phones, Mobile Trends, Nokia

Blogs are abuzz about the $70 million investment by Nokia in a mobile-phone-payment system called Obopay. A good article in Technology Review magazine sums the current trend of investment in mobile payment infrastructure. This will become the key to how first-time users of electronic commerce enter the global marketplace.

The investment by Nokia suggests that, even in a plunging global economy,mobile financial services are guaranteed to grow in many of the world’s poorest nations.

In these parts of the world, many people lack access to traditional bank accounts and other financial services, but own mobile phones. Leveraging those phones as a way for people to access bank accounts, pay bills, borrow money, and pay loans is “a market that is exploding,” says Carol Realini, Obopay’s CEO. Realini believes that mobile-phone technology will affect financial services in a number of ways. “It will allow transactions in checks and cash to be done electronically,” she says. “That is the source of the opportunity that is unfolding around the world.”

But Realini hinted at a huge scale-up in the global availability of mobile-payment services, especially given that about 1.3 billion Nokia phones are in circulation. “It really is about serving the globe,” she says. “[Nokia] makes around 1.2 million phones every day–we can add our capabilities to their distribution.” A Nokia spokesperson says that the company could not comment on the investment because it is in a quiet period ahead of an earnings announcement.

Obopay, based in Redwood City, CA, operates in the United States and India and is one of a handful of services that lets people transfer money to one another between bank accounts using a cell-phone software application or a text message. (Users can also do so via the Web, mobile or otherwise.) In the United States, Obopay charges a fee to users sending money (25 cents to send any amount up to $1,000). In India, fees for banking services are paid by banks, which have willingly done so because the service allows them to cultivate new account holders without having to build new retail branches. Obopay does not disclose its total number of customers in either country.

Nokia and Indus Hospital Implement Electronic Surveillance System for Pneumonia

Published by Arsalan Mir on March 20, 2009 under Healthcare, Nokia,Telecommunications, telemedicine

Nokia has proved that it can not only connect but care too. The press release below from Nokia below says it all.

The Indus Hospital Research Center and Nokia Pakistan announced the successful implementation of INTERACTIVE ALERTS, an electronic surveillance system for pneumonia in Karachi at a press conference held at the Indus Hospital. The Interactive Alerts system was designed by Interactive Research and Development (IRD), in collaboration with the Next Billion Network program at the MIT Media Lab.

The Interactive Alerts system has been specifically developed to use the Nokia 6131 NFC phone for childhood pneumonia surveillance and referral in low-resource settings, although it can be easily extended to other diseases. At the time of the 6-week vaccination visit, children are given a radio frequency ID (RFID) tag in the form of a traditional bracelet. This tag provides a unique ID to the child, and parents are advised and encouraged to take sick children to participating general practitioner clinics or general hospitals in the program. At each encounter, the Nokia 6131 NFC phone is used to scan the child’s tag. Pertinent immunization, clinical and laboratory data is collected and posted to the server via GPRS in real-time, and can be viewed over a secure website.

he innovativeness of this approach is that it helps overcome the challenges of disease tracking and patient referral in settings where medical records and referral systems do not exit. The RFID bracelet provides unique identification, allowing health workers to verify identity and view basic medical records, and respond to emergencies quickly.

Pneumonia is a leading cause of childhood death in countries with high under-5 mortality rates. Invasive pneumococcal disease is the # 1 vaccine-preventable cause of death in children under 5 years of age. The World Health Organization estimates that up to 1 million children under 5 die each year due to pneumococcal diseases.

IRD has established pneumonia surveillance in Karachi in collaboration with the Johns Hopkins University Bloomberg School of Public Health (JHSPH), the Program for Appropriate Technologies in Health (PATH) and the Indus Hospital. The objective of collecting this data is to provide policy makers in Pakistan and in the region the information required for introducing appropriate and new vaccines against pneumonia for children.

Interactive Alerts was co-developed by IRD’s health informatics team, led by Omar Allawala (Director of Information Technology) and Julia Irani (IT Project Manager),and a team of researchers and students from the Next Billion Network at MIT. The MIT team proposed the idea of using the Nokia NFC phones, and produced an initial design and working prototype, from which the IRD team then developed the final product.

Commenting on the project, Damien Balsan, Director, Head of NFC Business Development Americas, Nokia said, “We believe in a world where connecting people to what matters empower them to make the most of every moment. NFC is one of the ways to define the Nokia vision in terms of community services. We are committed to this project to ensure its expansion to a greater geographical area.”

This is a very encouraging step, finally we are seeing some research oriented approach in the communication industry of Pakistan. In my view IRD should come up with more projects of similar kinds and get Pakistani students on board to work along. Such initiatives will in turn acheive the main objective of all communication devices, i.e. serving the humanity in a better way!