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What made AePONA set up base in India?
There are a number of factors that led to our decision to enter the Indian market. Firstly, the market is growing at one of the fastest rates in the world, with more than 100 mn mobile subscribers today, growing by 30% annually. However, India is also one of the most price-competitive markets in the world, so ARPUis declining. In fact, monthly ARPU now sits well below $10, much lower than the western world. Therefore, operators are looking to offset this decline by launching new value-added services. This is where AePONA's solution comes in. Our platform is ideally suited to this market environment, as it allows a range of new applications, for both mass-market and business customers, to be rapidly developed and launched across the entire subscriber base.
 What kind of products and services AePONA be offering to would mobile operators?
AePONA's main product offering is the Universal Service Platform, a network software solution that contains the applications logic and network capabilities to provide a broad range of rapidly deployable, revenue-generating services to mobile, fixed-line and converged telecoms operators. AePONA's portfolio addresses what we are calling the Service Network, which represents an upper horizontal layer in the network hierarchy, sitting above the network control layer (switching, routing etc.) and the access layer (wireless, DSL, optical etc.). AePONA also offers a range of Expert Telecoms Services, based on our extensive experience in deploying Service Network solutions to Tier 1 operators at a global level.
Are you in talks with any of the Indian mobile operators for offering your products and services?
We have met most of the major Indian operators over the past week, including Bharti, Hutch, Idea, Reliance, BPL, MTNL and Tata Teleservices. Some of these discussions are at a more advanced stage than others, although we are not yet in a position to say which of these customers will be the first to deploy our solutions.
Have you set target on your market share in India? What is your current global market share?
It is difficult to be specific about market share, because the market we address spans multiple segments. However, AePONA is a recognized world leader in the OSA/Parlay gateway market and we currently have about 30% of this market in terms of deployed platforms. Regarding the Indian market, we have not set specific targets on market share, but we expect our business in India to be worth several tens of millions of dollars to AePONA over the next three years.
What is your global presence? Are you looking at venturing into any new market?
AePONA's headquarters is in the UK, specifically in Belfast, Northern Ireland. We also have operations in Bristol, and sales staff in Malaysia, China, the US, Germany, the Republic of Ireland and now India. AePONA currently has around 130 employees.
Bhaskar Hazarika
vadmail@cybermedia.co.in
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