In contrary to the reports that Mobile TV could be in India by end of 2008, CEO of OnMobile Mr Arvind Rao says that he is not hoping to have Mobile TV in near terms in India. First, the size of mobile phone screen is very small. You need a magnifying glass to see what is happening on the screen. Then most of the handsets are not supportive of it. Operators will have to make a lot of investments in this segment to make it successful. Therefore, he does not see any huge revenue potential from it in near future. [via telecomtiger]
I don’t think mobile users are going to stop watching the idiot box TV and start watching the Mobile TV. People would use Mobile TV when they are traveling or at work, or to watch something urgent like news and cricket when they are outside home. So the size of the screen doesn’t really matter for a short duration. My feeling is that, mobile companies have already invested a lot in building the infrastructure and is capable of handling Mobile TV bandwidth also.
Telecom providers like BPL Mobile already provide video on demand, real time news, etc on the mobile phones. In metros, many subscribers have the latest mobile handsets capable of watching high resolution videos, pictures, and even work like a better personal organizer. Looking at the growth of the industry, I am pretty sure that a lot of new great handsets will be in India and more people to subscribe to the Mobile TV. The mobile carriers would also provide a cheap startup Mobile TV plan to attract subscribers. I feel confident that the Mobile TV will be operational within a year in India.
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