With the Indian mobile handset market experiencing severe competition from China-made products, Munoth Communications Ltd. has hit upon a smart strategy to garner a piece of action in the dynamic mobile phone industry.
The Chennai-based listed company has joined hands with mobile phone makers in China and Hong Kong to launch a slew of branded mobile phones tailored to Indian requirements. These products include a mobile phone for senior citizens. This particular phone has a large key pad, bigger screen and torch-like switch. It has a red SOS button on the back, which activates a loud siren, alerting passers-by to his plight. Simultaneously, the phone sends out 10 pre-set SMSes to relatives, friends, doctors, ambulance and even to his insurance company. The mobile phone screen then freezes and displays the name of the person, a password and a link to a website where the medical records of the user is stored. Through a GPS system, the person's location is also known.
S5 or the senior citizen phone is priced at Rs. 2,500 to begin with. According to Jaswant Munoth, Managing Director, the phone would have an additional feature of a sensor, which could be carried on one's person. If one moved say 10 to 15 feet away from the phone, a beep would alert him that he had left the phone behind. “A person can even leave the mobile in a suitcase and it will alert you if someone moves it without your knowledge,” Mr. Munoth said. He said the company would soon tie up with a few insurance companies to take cognisance of such SMS alerts from insured patients. Mr. Munoth said the application-based phones would be targeted at the Rs. 1,400-4,000 price bracket. “We will be positioned in the upper-end of each segment,” he said at a press conference here on Wednesday.
Munoth also launched a ‘community phone' targeting the Jain community, which would be programmed with data on scriptures, festival dates, a locator for the nearest Jain temple when the user was travelling anywhere in the world and even a tracker which could tell one the movements of Jain acharyas, he said.
