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I have a Tata Docomo number; I have kept it for a temporarily.

Today, I was surprised to see that some SMS based service had been activated without my consent and I was charged for the same. At first, the customer care refused to accept it, despite my cajoling and raising my voice. After divine intervention, they agreed and refunded my amount.

What did I learn from this:

1) They are bad people and it’s a useless service.

2) Always take a complaint number. This is because, you can track down it’s progress by citing the complaint number in all the communication with the company. In the event of the matter landing in consumer court or forum, this is important.

3) Never bow down; if you have been wronged, fight them back.

By today evening, the issue was resolved, complaint closed and my amount refunded.

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Thursday and Friday meetings were held at Lightsquared Headquarters in Reston, Virginia. A source tells Broadband Reports a number of things were discussed, including the potential for removing network build obligations from Nokia and instead giving them to Alcatel-Lucent, Ericcson and Samsung. A primary discussion point at those meetings was something called “Project Freedom,” which the source insists to us is the codename for Sprint’s liberation of their 4G fortunes from Clearwire.

According to supporting documentation, Lightsquared informed meeting attendees they were working with a 3GPP2 partner “who will allow for Lightsquared to deploy its network much quicker.” This partner, which the attendee again insists is Sprint, would work in conjunction with Lightsquared to jointly develop and deploy cell sites. The satellite portion of Lightsquared’s network would not be impacted by this movement, and a second phase of Lightsquared’s ambitions would involve “adding support for MetroPCS diversity,” says the source.

Our 4G strategy is WiMAX, full stop!” -Sprint CEO, Dan Hesse

Last May Sprint issued an LTE build RFP, and for the last year we’ve heard from more than one Sprint employee that Sprint was absolutely migrating to LTE, despite several denials by Sprint CEO Dan Hesse. Last December Sprint announced a multi-billion dollar network overhaul paving the way for a streamlined footprint and LTE.

According to the Sprint network roadmap, the project involves having Alcatel-Lucent, Ericsson and Samsung retrofit every Sprint cell site, eliminating the refrigerator-sized cabinets for each technology (800 MHz, 1.9 GHz and 2.5 GHz) in favor of small, more energy efficient multi-mode base stations. The entire effort is expected to cost between four and five billion dollars, and will culminate in the phasing out of Sprint’s iDen network, something that will begin in 2013. More recently, Sprint has been claiming they could have a nationwide LTE network completed by the end of 2013, and LTE-ready smartphones on the market by the middle of 2012.

Instead of Nokia building Lightsquared’s network, Lightsquared plans to piggyback on the Sprint upgrades being performed by Alcatel-Lucent, Ericcson and Samsung — and share capacity on Sprint’s LTE network. That gives Sprint additional leverage in negotiations with Clearwire — or the option to detach entirely from an increasingly shaky relationship, which our source suggests is the direction Sprint’s heading. It’s possible that the Clearwire relationship could remain intact, but modified with Clearwire shifting to LTE as well. Regardless, this entire Sprint retrofit and partnership with Lightsquared (and their recent $586 million in fresh funding) appears to place Sprint squarely in the driver’s seat.
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Here’s from the BBC News where Ofcom wants the ISP’s to stop misleading news about Broadband.

Currently most ISPs advertise services as ‘up to’ a certain speed – for instance, 20Mbps (megabits per second).

But Ofcom’s latest research finds that very few consumers actually get these headline speeds.

“There is a substantial gap between advertised speeds and the actual speeds people get in their homes,” Ofcom chief executive Ed Richards told the BBC.

“The chances of someone receiving the advertised headline speed are fairly remote,” he said.

“We would like to see clearer information provided to consumers which more accurately reflects the likely speeds they will actually receive,” he added.

For those who are blissfully unaware, Ofcom is British Telecom Regulatory Agency.

Here’s the proposal:

“We have been pushing for ‘typical speeds’ to be made the gold standard for speed measurement since 2007 – in the same way that banks use ‘typical’ APR percentages.”

The Advertising Standards Authority is looking into the issue.

Ofcom is recommending that ISPs use Typical Speed Rates (TSR) to avoid confusing consumers.

Here’s a stinker:

Virgin Media, which fared the best in the speed tests, welcomed the news: “Ofcom’s latest report is yet another damning indictment that consumers continue to be treated like mugs and misled by ISPs that simply cannot deliver on their advertised speed claims,” said Jon James, executive director of broadband at Virgin Media

We in India, are stuck at 256 kbps. What the fuck is TRAI‘s problem? Why can’t we have someone who can actually deliver?

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Over the past few years, they entered into Telecom; bought over VSNL for their broadband and international telephony needs, misread the market, entered into CDMA and then forked into GSM with two competing brands- Virgin Mobile and Tata DoCoMo. While Virgin Mobile had it’s CDMA avatar (now in GSM), Docomo is spearheading it’s 3G foray.

In all the hoopla, it has carved a niche for itself by being an idiot and super idiot at the same time. There is no parallel in the world (not to my knowledge) where a same company would fight for the same customer pool. Leave aside it’s mobile business (which is opaque as far as the revenues are concerned), it’s broadband strategy is in tatters.

Hence when Forbes India came up with the cover story on Tata’s Telecom strategy, I was eagerly awaiting the web version because this crap is not worth the paper it is printed on (and hence not worth the money spent on this tattered crap rag). I was proved right when the “journalist” in question hammed on the same issue time and again; perhaps without even realizing that one needs to have an in-depth understanding of the sector. The title says a lot about the “telecom strategy” but sadly these morons on Forbes have restricted themselves to “mobile segment” alone.

I refuse to account for the sector changes or even track the people involved in decision making. This is not my specialty or my interest. My only interest is to get a better deal as a customer; see it through the prism of my own understanding and spout out my “wisdom”.

The whole article talks about the sectoral changes due to Mobile Number Portability or Spectrum charges being traded in “business publications” elsewhere. It does not make even one fucking cursory mention about it’s strategy elsewhere; where it has met it’s waterloo and has been drubbed by customers square- Broadband.

I don’t understand; really don’t understand as to why these idiots cant scale up the platform. They have DTH; they make tonnes in carriage fees (as per the media reports) and burning huge amount of cash in customer acquisition. A proper broadband access (and a portal) with content cross ported from DTH (if you take care of the license issues- what the fuck is their army of lawyers doing?) and you have a sure fire recipe for success.

Of course, this has to come with a balance of right targets and marketing. Last mile access alone is a major issue but not for the class B and class C cities and towns where they could have become the default broadband service providers. But because it needs funds, long term vision and skill of execution, Tatas are found wanting.

Forbes India disappoints me. Not that I had expected a stellar reporting from them but at least SOME bloody semblance of balance in the story. It only points towards the idea bankruptcy, lack of sectoral understanding and oodles of stupidity.

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I do fail to understand as to how the wireless would address the “broadband” issues for this country. I am not sure about the latency periods or the ping times and whether or not adding more subscribers would strech this service. But keeping high initial costs means that the early bunch of adopters would be subsidising for the people signing up later.

I find this idea stupid, so as to say, because the morons are trying to cash on in the desperation of the early few in order to milk their set up costs. But, as I understand, the incremental cost of setting up new infrastructure would be minimal in case they have to “re-jig” their existing towers. Plus, these companies should be able to get the brand new equipment over comfortable cost without adding much to the overheads by long term negotiations.

I wouldn’t be surprised if the useless Chinese crap gets a back door entry in the country.

Tatas are not known for their exemplary workmanship nor customer care. I feel that it is the “mill mentality” which pervades; their steel plant would get customers anyway. It is the take it or leave it attitude that pervades and till the time they are hauled over the coals by squeezing their balls black and blue, I doubt whether anyone would be constrained to deliver.

They make the worst Indian cars and trucks; Tata tea addresses majorly the lower end of the market with their “pataka chai” and Tata Indicom needed Virgin mobile because their claims have been deflowered by the prevailing situation. I don’t trust their claims verbatim because there is nothing in black and white in their account books or independent verification for their tall claims about the network superiority.

Photon plus remains another empty promise with awkward tariff plans. Beware, as usual!

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First, the contentious number portability system is going to be launched initially in the four metros. I can bet that this would come into play only after Reliance launches it’s GSM service. For very obvious reasons because it would be betting big on the churn specially from the lower end of the market. It has already placed orders for “millions of handsets” and is looking forward to flood Indian market with “choice”. Expect some rude shocks for the incumbents.

The exact mechanism isn’t clear but there is going to be a big mess initially. I am sure that the operators would want to put across punitive “termination charges”, get host of clearances etc etc before you can heave a sigh of relief from it’s evil clutches. Yet, there is no differentiator between the Shylocks and the Satans in the market because at end of the day, they are all part of the same shit hole. Expect some high voltage drama here.

Second, the 3G licenses would be issued. There is no final word as to how this is going to be achieved; we are waiting for the Minister to feed fat on more money. By the way, Pioneer has a damning expose on their wrong doings over the past one year. (Link Source) Unless,Mr Minister is fed fat in his Swiss Bank account (Indian banking system sucks) we are not going to see anything move in this direction.

Mobile value added services is not going to add anything extra unless operators offer free porn. Imagine, free streaming porn without any restriction and daily MMS scandals! Since, Indians are loath to accept anything that comes out in the open, they could start streaming this for select few, obviously for a higher remuneration. I wonder why no one has thought about it. Callback ringtones are a passe’. So, not much of an action there too.

Mobile Virtual Network Operators would perhaps be legalised under immense pressure from the business house of Tatas. They are very keen to expand their “brand”; I have not seen any major advertising campaign from Virgin Mobile in recent times. They are spiked and spooked and relegated to some corner uncared for. How would that really matter? Does having more operators actually make sense? I believe that one size fits all strategy is not feasible. There are scores of people who would be happy to make unlimited outgoing calls for a fixed sum. Some people like to call telemarketing companies for pranks. Some people like to call fixed “hotline numbers” which offer “anonymity” without realising that the calls are routed within India alone. Some people like SMS alone. I feel that there would be companies to cater to such sections of deviants alone unless someone wants to prove me wrong.

So basically, we are left with no real action. 3G and number portability would be launched when Reliance announces it’s intention to start it’s GSM services. 3G licenses would be auctioned when Mantri ji has a green signal from his swiss banker. MVNO is an old tune from equally old flute; after virgin’s debacle no one wants to burn their backsides.

Where does the landline fit it? What of the frigging e governance issues? What of the “e learning”? Sheesh. Such lofty ideals would be done to waste? Who has the time to bother about such issues?

Although, I do see some reduction in the price when the price of international bandwidth crashes; the demand from the cyber coolies reduces as a result of economic downturn and telecom operators would be forced to deploy their “excessive bandwidth” for residential purposes. We might see the death of dial up; unless BSNL wants to keep it on a life support system. Since, they are only ones on the national scene offering it for free! Morons.

Happy 2009!

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The “bastard” of this company is trying to grab attention like an unwanted company. It makes tall claims about it’s “superior network coverage” and it’s “young outlook”. Pooh. Who the f*** cares about it anyway? On what basis has it made these claims? It’s hard to discount it, nevertheless, we could take it with a pinch of salt anyway.

Their website is an overdose of flashturbation. Its a bad idea to attract the dudes who have no decent access to broadband. In anycase, it chokes on my crappy bandwidth of BSNL at home.

I have no clue about the new “execs” at the helm of the affairs but if their CEO is a rich bored millionaire who has nothing else to do excpet launching himself in hot air balloons or dance with skimpy chicks, it speaks a lot about the professional attitude of a company. It doesnt promote the seriousness with which it needs to be taken; instead I have a creepy feeling that they are just fly by night operators.

The idiots need to realise it that a strong message doesnt go by having whacky advertisements. Drop down the prices, subisdise the cost of the handsets and bleed the new players by being able to offer services based on quality. I still have to come across a subscriber of this company who has said anything positive about there efforts. I wouldnt be surprised if they give in free mobiles with a rider of a locked in period. Unless they have enough balls to do it.

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Here in the grand strategy of Anil Ambani unfolds. He got the ad labs, poured in money in content creation and would make a huge moolah out of “exclusive” deals with media players. The value added services is a growing market and there is a HUGE space for exclusive content; I was surprised to know that there is a seperate channel for gardening; Tata has one for home tuitions. Although, it cannot replace the classrooms but then parents are keen for any degree of experimentation.

Coming back to IPTV. Does anyone of you readers think that this could make any degree of impact on the viewership? I feel that most of the people mistrust the landline outages (which are so frequent) unless there is a fibre to home coming to their homes with simple instructions to operate the set top box. The present hardware is designed to confuse the first time users; somewhere it ought to ring the bell to make it as simple as possible.

I would reserve my comments on the two competing platforms till the market matures up. Reliance is lying down low with it’s broadband offering. I am still wondering as to what has been the issue at their end. Why are they delaying the commercial launch? There are any number of ideas floating around and if they claim to be India’s number one network as far as the coverage is concerned, they ought to focus on their cherries. Or else, it would die a virgin.

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Duh. This is the level to which Virgin Mobile stoops, atleast in US. I wonder whether they can pull of something like this on Indian airwaves. There was a lull in their advertising but the billboards are back and with increased intensity. They are betting big on their incoming calls being paid with branded handsets.

It only goes to prove that the new players would do anything to grab attention and vie for the new customers. I believe that the only way to add customers and retain them is via superior service levels rather than gimmicks like these or the Voadfone’s pug. It only adds choas to the confusion because there is no clear message to the customers. Many people are pissed off or even daunted to talk to the “agents” because they remain faceless and nameless. This means that most of the complaints remain unresolved. I still have to see some kind of an open interaction with the telecom companies and the customers on the websites or otherwise on an open forum where the top heads address the concerns. Once the media comes on in it, I am sure it would give them a lot of mileage. They would be much better off with ideas like these rather than have an idiot endorsing their products for a fancy fee.

By the way, most of the Indians use water for ablutions. It is much more safer and cleaner.

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They have brilliant ad campaigns backed by one of the lousiest customer care services. This explains their tag line, “think hatke” because they want to do something that no one else would ever even think of doing to annoy an independent blogger whose content is being syndicated by Google in real time.

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This is in response to the earlier post; their PR division has hired some lady called as Priya. She minces no words when she leaves comments on this blog like “fucking losers”. She claims that she is being unduly victimised online on this blog and something like this :

i suppose this blog has got u some sort of clicks since its a bunch of pansies taking on a girl online…otherwise “crap” and “fart” as usual.

It’s easier not to bother about the punctuation. As far as “pansies” taking a girl online, speak of gender equality!

I gave adeqaute coverage to their point of view as well; unfortunately, they chose to complicate the matters in the email and then claim that they don’t want to reach out to independent bloggers. I can’t help someone’s perception of calling us names; it only exposes their own shortcomings to come to terms with life. People of this bent of mind are often suicidal and have desperate tendencies. They are the ones who end up having nervous breakdowns, grope in dark and extremely prone to hurt themselves and the people around them. Such people need to be handled with care under the expert supervision of a shrink.

Get some life sweetheart. And stop feeling deluded about being persecuted.

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I am opposed to the deal because it means that the telecom companies are entering the country via “brand tie ups”. What avoids AT&T or for that matter any other company buying undisclosed stock and shares and entering in the country in the name of brand building?

I have never liked the limeys and been always fearful of their intentions. This is reverse colonisation in the garb of globalisation. Instead of hailing this as the next big thing in Telecom industry, Tatas ought to be ashamed to have sold their “assets” for a fistful of pounds.

Virgin sucks. Their PR disasters are well known. They have not been able to issue a denial nor actively court the media. It wouldn’t be out of place to mention that unless they actively engage the bloggers (who are potential customers), they wouldn’t get their dues. Further, most of the Gen X generation would probably search Internet before they settle in for this service.

A company that cannot clarify it’s intentions before the launch cannot be relied on providing decent after sales service.

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Why Neha Dhupia at the launch? She hardly has anything worthwhile to her credit, she’s got fake tits and a face that minus the oodles of make up, she would scare you in the dark. I wonder as to why Virgin India couldn’t find anyone more worthwhile.

Admittedly, the launch of Virgin India in the mobile sector was a big news all over. This is a clear cut testimony to his marketing skills. Unfortunately, their PR division hasn’t been up to the mark at all(1,2,3).

I wish them all the best for whatever they can salvage.

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This is a comment posted on the blog entry by one Ms Priya who probably works for them in their PR division. I have no means of ascertaining the facts and is based on assumptioms here. Here is what she has to say:

who the hell do you think you are? Its one thing to be right about something and explain the “crap” offered by companies, but you, you think you are the guy that knows ALL. Tell me why the hell you are sitting in front of some computer and typin this “crap” then? The answer is coz no one will hire you with your load of crap. You are one of those people who dont know how to put things in perspective. You prefer to make issues personal and you dont want to see what others are tying to point you understand. You are one of those people in any organisation that is a liability coz all you do if fart around pretending like you know everything and do no work. Hopefully next time you will have something more substantial to say when u “crap” out a company. you build no authenticity to your case and thats visible from the first comment you have recvd.

She waxes and wanes about me farting all around taking me to be a part of some organisation! Naive. Very naive. Unfortunately, she fails to rectify her grammar which only speaks volumes about the company and it’s hiring policies.

Sometimes, I seem to get a kick out of these kind of comments. I put them in front of you to decide without getting biased about it all. A blog remains a blog; it is an expression of what you feel and is preserve of one’s opinions. If someone from the PR Department of some company is not happy about my opinion, this is what I get!

These companies don’t realise that blogging community as a whole needs to be engaged. I am not sure about the kind of press handouts that these companies give to the mainstream media. Why would they send a half baked truth to a blogger? Then retract the same by claiming that the email attachment was a mistake!

Bottom line is that PR department from Virgin India Mobile needs more education in civil exchange of words instead of claiming that the authors are farts.

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It has been a fiasco. Tatas feel that they can roughshod over the existing laws and garner a share of suckers who feel that it’s cool to get paid for incoming calls. Bah! How naive can people get? I believe, that one has to pay something upfront to “activate this service”. In any case, this is only product differential they have in an increasingly crowded market. With the eminent launch of newer services, this segment of consumers would surely weigh in gimmicks like these to purchase.

Their offer of handsets sucks. Although, this is good news for those who swear by CDMA. Department of Telecom has referred this matter to TRAI to look in the legal aspects of having Virgin Mobile.

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I fired an email to their PR division. Their comments came in an attachment; not a good PR strategy in my opinion. They should have sent a seperate email or should have had a logo prominently displayed.

Here is the exact copy. My comments appear in italics in paranthesis.

1) Is Virgin a Mobile Virtual Network Operator independently acting in India?
Virgin Mobile services are being offered to consumers by Tata Teleservices through a brand franchise with the Virgin Group. This means that Virgin Mobile is a brand of Tata Teleservices. This brand franchise is within the permitted norms of license agreement of Tata Teleservices (Confused statements. Nevertheless, the supposed licence agreements have been invalidated by Department of Telecom in their wisdom. The email from the PR division came in before this happened).

2) Do you have a tie up with Tata Teleservices?

Virgin Mobile India is an equitable partnership (then what is the brand frachise?)between Virgin Group and Tata Teleservices. Virgin Mobile India will provide Tata Teleservices with experience and expertise in designing, marketing, and servicing Virgin Mobile branded products for the youth segment.

3) Who has designed your website?
Need inputs (Ha! They don’t know the name of their web designer!!! This has been prominently displayed on their home page. At first, I realised the futility of the question AFTER I had sent the email. However, even I was not prepared for their answer. Anyone with the right brains could have easily figured that out. Despite all the flash, it is choked of coding errors- a common refrain of most of the websites not designed to comply with web standards).

4) Why do you make service guarantees for network availability? Are you 100% sure that your network would not fail as compared to other service providers?
Virgin Mobile places huge importance on ensuring that we deliver a high quality service to customers. This philosophy pervades in everything that we do- quality of network, range of handsets, value added services on offer, customer care etc. We chose Tata Teleservices because we believe it has the best quality network in India (Who decides that?). According to published reports (where?), Tata Teleservices has the lowest dropped call rates and one of the lowest blocking rates in the industry(how?). This means that ‘Virgin Mobile’ branded customers will reliably be able to enjoy clear calls, a fast connection and low dropped-call rates(Low dropped call rates? Despite the network, customers would still experience call drops! Even though, they may be low by industry standards!!!).

5) Why did you choose to go ahead with Virgin?
Virgin brings extensive experience and expertise in targeting the youth market across 7 countries over the last 8 years. It is this experience, service innovation and ability to catch the pulse on the youth market that makes Virgin a perfect partner for our ‘youth’ brand.

All in all, it remains a perfect example of PR crap. Tata seriously needs a reality check. They have honest intentions; they need to tap the youth market. Their perception in the market is jaded and also ran; which is different from say Hutch. Most of the companies are aspiring for “youth tag” and hope that it would add “zing” to the company.

Why youth? They aspire for a better lifestyle and if a brand fits in their perceptions of being the “right one”, they would splurge on it. It remains true for the metros as well as the smaller towns and cities. However, Virgin Mobile would need massive advertising money to cause a “brand recall”, just like they have associated a dog with Hutch. For the same reason, having Shah Rukh Khan for Airtel has not worked well because he endorses many other brands. Further, Airtel’s marketing division is pits.

I feel that the PR divisions needs a better infusion of brains than the current crop of retards that presently infest them. They need to tone up their language primarily because flowery English doesnt work. Unless someone is looking at impressing some starry eyed nut.

By the way, their website designer is bcwebwise. It speaks very highly of it’s boss who is an ex journo and has ventured in web designing. It has jarring colours and as usual coding errors Not a very comforting thought to pay dollops of money to those who cant even ensure compliance to web standards.

Update: I got an email from their PR agency saying that the attachment was sent by mistake. They wanted to send a further email from their PR agency regarding the new development of licence norms. They wanted my telephone number in order to speak to me and clarify issues.

Incidentally, Virgin India came with front page advertisement on 10/03/2008 in Delhi edition of Times of India. They are paying the customers to recieve incoming calls. In my opinion, this is basically a gimmick to lure in customers initally; their call rates are almost similar as that of other operators.

I shall keep this post updated as and when newer developments happen.

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Broadband would have to wait till July end (tentatively) and the Mbps plans are no where around the scene. My “mole” in Reliance marketing office was at pains to explain to me about the “speeds” on dial up. Imagine. I could have puked there but held myself. He even claimed that video conferencing was possible on 256k line.Reliance isn’t getting any “talent” and they picked up the “smartest of the morons” available.

I wonder whether anyone from Reliance is reading this. If you have such employees who bull shit their potential customers, you are dead as a dodo. Specially the customers who blog.

September is the probable slated launch for Reliance’s Blue Magic or DTH service. I doubt. There hasn’t been much activity on ground as yet. Would Reliance appoint dealers to scale up? If yes, there should have been advertisements in the newspapers calling for the same. None. The existing Web World properties are now creaking. With peeling paint, broken chairs, crashing PC’s (running Windows- what else!), the only thing that is missing in web world is the smell of sweat and urine. And the web worlds lack any space for expansion to cater to the expected increased demand for Blue Magic. Anil Ambani would either have to appoint third party dealers (leading to mismanagement of the customer’s expectations) or scale up independently via company owned showrooms. This would obviously lead to duplication of costs.

DTH is a holy cow untouched by regulations and only dominant player in India is Subash Chandra’s Dish TV. There is a lot of bitching about the Digital Video Recorders (DVR’s) and their hopeless quality. However, this is a virgin market and the players are milking it for all it’s worth.

DTH needs a seperate post though.

Reliance would need all the marketing muscle it can muster to make it happen.

Finally though, Reliance is loosing it’s sheen. It may have the numbers (trumped up mostly), but this is backed by opaque clauses, absolutely nil transparency and billing glitches galore. The biggest drawback is to “outsource” the “core” billing collections to third parties who leave no stone unturned to make the experience as hell.

In my opinion, Reliance has to fight the perception of a company which doesn’t care.It is definitely a tough call; rebranding exercise or not. An ageing star brand ambassador cannot do anything about it.

(Update:This is edited version of what appeared earlier on in the morning. I was at the mercy of my electricity company and had to hurriedly “save” the post). Apologies).

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