Sabeer Bhatia launches mobile answer phone service in Pune

PUNE: Speaking at the launch of Televoice service, Sabeer Bhatia said, " The voicemail facility on mobile phones would not only do away with the trouble of missed calls, but also actually help increase economic activities. This service would also enable a person from a landline to leave a voice message to the cellular subscriber".

The voicemail service, which begins from midnight of December 23, would enable a BPL mobile subscriber to get a voice message even when his/her cellular phone is switched off or out of coverage area.

Explaining the working of the system, Vinay Agarwal, Chief Operating Officer (COO) of BPL for Maharashtra circle, said that the voicemail service offers the natural benefit of listening to voice with all its intonations and nuances rather than just reading a text message. "A subscriber can retrieve any of the messages lying in the voicemail box at a cost of Rs 1.50 at any given time and place," he said. The facility would be offered free of cost as a promotional offer till January 1, 2003.






Bhatia, on his first visit to the city, said that his company had decided to work on voice messaging services, as the percentage of calls lost by a person on the move despite having a mobile was very high. In India, televoice services are offered by Navinmail Services ( India) Pvt Ltd, a wholly owned subsidiary of Navin Communications Inc., based in California, he said. Bhatia who is the president and CEO of the company said that the company would focus on applications related to televoice and telepower. He said that Navinmail had raised its second round of funding from the US, which would see it through for the next couple of years.





Asked if Telepower would be marketed in the US, Bhatia replied that these kind of applications were more relevant to developing countries like India and China since voicemail has been around in US for a long time and therefore the focus is on such virgin markets.