Technology Guru

Looking to take on Reliance Jio in the handset space, the country’s top telecom operator, Bharti Airtel, has partnered Karbonn Mobiles to offer a 4G smartphone at an “effective price” of Rs 1,399.  In a dig at Jio’s Rs 1,500 4G-enabled feature phone, the Sunil Bharti Mittal-led company said its smartphone would be made available for the price of a feature phone. Airtel said this was the first of several partnerships it plans with handset manufacturers to bring affordable bundled 4G smartphone options to its customers. In July, Jio had announced a 4G feature phone for a security deposit of Rs 1,500, returnable at the end of three years for a full refund, making the device virtually free for consumers.  “A customer needs to make a down-payment of Rs 2,899 for the 4G smartphone and make 36 continuous monthly recharges of Rs 169 each. The customer will get a cash refund of Rs 500 after 18 months and another Rs 1,000 after 36 months, taking the total cash benefit to Rs 1...

HMD Global, the official company behind Nokia-branded mobile phones, is mulling to enter the emerging 4G feature phone segment that has garnered Indian consumer’s interest especially after the launch of Reliance JioPhone. “JioPhone is definitely going to have impact on the segment, and there is no question about it. We are watching how this materialises. If we see a viable business proposition, we will definitely consider it and participate,” said Ajey Mehta, India VP for HMD Global to the Economic Times.  Recently, HMD Global launched a 3G-enabled Nokia 3310 in Australia. The feature phone boasts all the features that were there in the non-3G model plus a few more such as Facebook, Twitter and Skype apps. With data war between the telecos bolstering up and does not seem to cool down anytime soon, the 4G LTE feature phone creates a different preposition for price conscious Indian customers. Apart from Reliance Jio, companies like Lava mobiles and I...