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T E L E C O M S
products which the Group has
introduced.
Of these, the most significant has
been the introduction of roaming
services. In 1996, Hutchison Max
Telecom was the first cellular company
to establish national roaming, and
today Hutchison affiliates offer con-
nections to over 400 Indian cities and
78 countries, making it India’s top
roaming operator with over 23% of
the roaming business.
Another key service to have found
favour with users is SMS. Hutchison’s
affiliates were the first to open up
their networks to SMS, and since
November 2000 the proportion of
their consumer base using SMS has
soared from 13% to 60-70%. Fascel
created SMS in “Gujlish,” a mix of
English and the local state language,
and each affiliate has produced an
innovative SMS dictionary of words,
phrases and “emoticons,” further pro-
moting SMS usage.
Hutchison also took the lead in
providing value-added services by
regularly sending
Privileges
booklets
containing the latest offers from lead-
ing international and national brands.
Alliances have been forged with the
top hotel chains and the finest restau-
rants and shops, providing customers
with a bounty of attractive offers. On
average, there is a remarkable 15%
redemption rate and the favourite cat-
egories are dining, holidays, shop-
ping and entertainment. In Mumbai
alone, over 125,000 customers have
utilised these offers, which are now
being replicated elsewhere so that,
on an all-India basis, customers can
benefit locally and when roaming.
“The products we develop on our
own are exciting and totally relevant
to the market,” says Ghosh.
For example, the innovative Voice
Recognition Service enables sub-
scribers in Mumbai to access real-time
news, stock market information, and
cricket scores via a single number.
The product has been developed
using a cutting-edge platform that
allows users to interact with the sys-
tem in a manner closely resembling
human conversation. The user-friendly
interface hides the complexity of the
technology, which allows the system
to be navigated using common
words, like “cricket.” More than
Perseverance in a difficult market has borne fruit for Hutchison.
India is mired in the fixed-line
era with low penetration and
unreliable connections.
Analogue telephone exchanges
are outdated, costly and
inefficient. Fixed line tele-
density is less than 2% and it
can take years to get a
connection.The Group enters
the Indian market through
Hutchison Max Telecom—a JV
partnership with local company
Max India.
PRE
-1992
The Mumbai licence is
issued in November and
Hutchison Max Telecom moves
quickly to build a network.
1994
Hutchison Max Te lecom
launches the Max Touch brand
following an advertising
campaign in which celebrities
endorse the “Hello Bombay”
tagline. Cricketer Sunil
Gavaskar makes the first call
on July 16 to Analjit Singh,
Chairman of Hutchison Max
Telecom.This is followed by a
soft launch in September and
commercial operations begin
in November.
1995
In December, Max Touch
becomes the first operator to
bundle airtime and handsets.
Handsets retail for about
US$1,400, while calls cost a
prohibitive US$0.52 per
minute.The bundling strategy
reduces costs and has an
immediate positive effect on
customer offtake. Subscribers
now talk more and are
motivated to stop using cell
phones as pagers.
Hutchison Max Telecom also
becomes the first to establish
national roaming services.
1996
In August, for the first time
ever in India, Hutchison Max
Telecom introduces prepaid cell
phone cards over the counter,
without the need for paper-
work or documentation,
further increasing mass access
to mobile communications.
1997
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