Telecom, technology to focus on rural areas

sNEW DELHI, INDIA: The thrust of the government and corporates in areas of technology and telecom in 2011 will be to help empower the rural population, a study by advisory firm Deloitte said on Friday.

"With most of the population living in villages in India, there is huge opportunity for technology, media and telecom sectors to bring services such as healthcare, education, entertainment, banking and finance to the rural doorsteps," said Jolyon Barker, global leader of technology, media and telecommunications at Deloitte.

With the teledensity in India reaching over 128 per cent in the urban markets, the telecom industry now has its eyes set on the rural market which holds a great potential with a teledensity of less than 26 per cent.

The variety of programmes around the National e-Governance Plan and the funding from donor agencies in this region will be key in taking this forward.

The study also predicted that in 2011, more than 50 per cent of computing devices sold globally will be smartphones, tablets and non-PC (personal computer) netbooks, breaking the PC's decades-long market dominance.

In India, 80 per cent of the smartphone market is still untapped, the study said.

The price of handsets and cost of data usage will decide the penetration of smarphones in these areas, it added.reeni