234 - Datawind silently introduces improved version of Ubislate 7Cz Mobile Indian

Datawind silently introduces improved version of Ubislate 7Cz

By Anil Satapathy, The Mobile Indian, New Delhi, August 24, 2013 

Notably Aakash 4 tablet is set to be launched in January next year.

Datawind, the maker of Ubislate and first three versions of Aakash tablet, has silently introduced an improved version of Ubislate 7Cz which was launched earlier this year.

Curiously, the original Ubislate 7Cz is yet to be made available in the market. Infact, many online retailers have recently started taking pre-orders for the original Ubislate 7Cz for Rs 5,799. However, the improved version is now being offered by Datawind itself for Rs 5,999 (final price Rs 6,299).

But if you are thinking to buy the older Ubislate 7Cz as it is Rs 200 cheaper then think again as there is a lot of difference between the two. For instance, the older version comes with Android ICS operating system against Android 4.1 of the newer version. Also, as compared to 4 GB internal storage, the upgraded Ubislate 7Cz has 8 GB of internal memory. Also the new version comes with 1 GB RAM against 512 MB of the older model.

Other than those there seems to be not much difference between the two versions. So like the older model, the new Ubislate 7Cz has a 7 inch capacitive touchscreen with 800x480 pixels resolution, 1.2 GHz dual core processor, dual camera (VGA front, 2 MP rear), WiFi, Bluetooth, and 32 GB expandable memory.

Currently, the upgraded Ubislate 7Cz is available through Datawind's website. The company is promising to deliver the tablet within one week if you pay online and if you pay through demand draft or Cheque, you will have to wait for two weeks. Cash on delivery option is also available but for that also Datawind is said to take two weeks' time to deliver the tablet.

It is to be noted that the fourth generation Aakash 4 tablet is set to come in January next year and probably it would not be manufactured by Datawind which was criticized heavily in the past for the poor quality and non availability of the previous versions of Aakash tablet. Also, as per the proposed features, the Aakash 4 is speculated to be a block-buster Android tablet in the low-end segment.

233 - 'The Aakash Can Help Drive US Tablet Prices Down'

Published On :Mon, Aug 19,2013

'The Aakash Can Help Drive US Tablet Prices Down'

Source: soc.duke.edu

"I see Aakash also as a way to force US tablet prices to drop--bring in some competition from abroad," says Silicon Valley-based entrepreneur-academic Vivek Wadhwa

Interviews | by Prasanto K Roy

Silicon Valley-based Vivek Wadhwa is an evangelist for low-cost tablets. This entrepreneur-academic (at Stanford and Singularity universities) has written in the Washington Post and elsewhere about their ability to transform education and lives. Here, he tells Prasanto K Roy that low-cost tablets like the Aakash can help bridge the digital divide in the US too-and help drive tablet prices down "toward zero."

Q: The Aakash is a cheap tablet designed for India's students. Would it work in the US?

Vivek Wadhwa: After meeting children from East Palo Alto and Oakland-which are poorer parts of Silicon Valley that no one likes to talk about-I realized that there was a huge digital divide. Poor children were being left out of the innovation economy. They had cheap cell phones but no laptops or tablets. They weren't tech savvy like their counterparts in Palo Alto and Berkeley.

ALSO READ: Aakash tablets in US pilot projects

Q: A digital divide in the homeland of tech, of Apple and Microsoft?

Vivek Wadhwa: Look at the strategy that the big technology players-Apple, Microsoft, Dell, Samsung-employ. They target their products at the rich, and keep their prices high. They keep releasing new features, such as retina screens, rather than dropping prices.

Q: Could the Aakash affect these vendors, or is the low-end a different market they're not interested in?

Vivek Wadhwa: Well, I see Aakash also as a way to force US tablet prices to drop-bring in some competition from abroad.

Q: Are you serious? Is that likely?

Vivek Wadhwa: This is a classic example of reverse innovation at work. Ideas and innovations conceived in India can positively impact the developed world. My goal is to cause tablet prices in the US and abroad to fall precipitously-to the $50 level and head towards zero.

Q: Whom did you have to convince, to get the Aakash into US pilots?

"I see Aakash also as a way to force US tablet prices to drop--bring in some competition from abroad," says Silicon Valley-based entrepreneur-academic Vivek Wadhwa

Vivek Wadhwa: I discussed this with my friends, people such as Lotus founder Mitch Kapor, Zappos founder Tony Hseh, Kim Polese, Aneesh Chopra, and others. They were as excited as I was about the potential for bridging the technology gap. Chris Evans is someone I have known from my tech days. When he heard about my plans to bring Aakash to the US, he wanted to be part of this.

Q: Was it difficult selling the idea of something that had drawn so much flak in India?

Vivek Wadhwa: Not at all. Unlike many Indians who condemned the Aakash because of its early failures, American technology executives understand that there are many failures on the path to success. They expect version 1 technologies to have difficulties.

I understand the Aakash has already been deployed in pilot projects in African countries in the thousands, and even in Mexico.

Those projects are good to have. But for technology, the world looks to the US. What happens here matters more than anywhere else.

Q: What's next? Where do you see this experiment headed in the US?

Vivek Wadhwa: Just watch. I expect many other regions to do similar experiments to what they are doing in North Carolina. Stay tuned.

232 - DataWind running Aakash-like pilot projects in US: Report

DataWind running Aakash-like pilot projects in US: Report

By Kul Bhushan

on

19-08-2013

DataWind has shipped 2,000 Aakash tablets in the US under a pilot project aimed at helping out the unprivileged students.

DataWind, the company that spear-headed the Aakash project in India, is now working to expand its base in the U.S. with a similar concept of delivering an ultra low-cost tablet PC to help underprivileged schoolchildren in their studies. The company has reportedly already run pilot projects in North Carolina state of the US and San Francisco city.

According to reports, Arlington, Virginia-headquartered not-for-profit organization Communities in Schools (CIS) completed an experiment in Wake County, where 100 units of the Aakash 2 tablet were used for the students. DataWind supplied the tablets at $45, price point that helped the company bag the contract.

“The price point was a game-changing factor for us. As a non-profit, we depend upon corporate and individual donors to meet most of our expenses, and tight economic conditions put most tablet-learning ideas out of reach for us. The $50 price point of a Wi-Fi tablet (free Wi-Fi is available in many of the student’s neighbourhoods) made it an affordable pilot and something we could conceivably use on a widespread basis,” Chris Evans, a technology entrepreneur who is leading the CIS project in North Carolina is quoted as saying.

According to reports, DataWind has shipped around 2,000 Aakash tablet PCs in the U.S. DataWind CEO Suneet Singh Tuli acknowledgement the company's efforts in the US with such pilot projects.

“When we commercially launch in the US, we expect the US market to reach a million units in the first year (the same quantum as what we’re placing currently in the Indian market), but we expect the market to grow exponentially,” Tuli is quoted as saying.

“Several parents of the students have already asked about purchasing the tablets for their children after the pilot and seemed very happy with the price. Nearly all the parents of our kids live on public assistance, and so it’s very encouraging that they would be so willing to buy the Aakash for their children,” added Evans.

The new report comes shortly after the company hinted at entering the US market and confirmed filing a 'product' with the FCC that it intends to release in the U.S. and India. DataWind plans to officially release the tablet, dubbed UbiSlate 3G7, in the next four to six weeks.

“At this stage, we cannot confirm a date for release, but expect to announce its release in the next four to six weeks. We’re committed to delivering a break-through price, as we continue to focus on expanding internet penetration in numerous markets globally,” Suneet Singh Tuli said in a statement.

231 - India's Aakash tablet finds its way into pilot projects for US children p Economic Times

India's Aakash tablet finds its way into pilot projects for US children

IANS Aug 19, 2013, 11.48AM IST

By: Prasanto K Roy

After a few minutes on the Aakash, a five-year-old American kid proudly announced he had achieved Level 4 in an addition game. He'd started the day at Level 1. These poorer kids in North Carolina were already picking up skills they'd be learning in the next school year, which was unprecedented - they would usually start off the year at a disadvantage.

The world's cheapest Made-in-India tablet, nicknamed Aakash (sky), had promised to transform Indian education. Instead, the government project got mired in delays and controversies in India. Meanwhile, the $50 Aakash tablet was creating a buzz in a dozen countries, and in the United Nations, where it was showcased last November.

Now, the Aakash has just completed a pilot in the US state of North Carolina, with 100 units of the Android tablets deployed in summer camps for poorer schoolchildren (mostly under age 10) to help them prepare for next year's studies. And there are other projects under way, with 2,000 tablets - DataWind's Aakash-equivalent UbiSlate models - already deployed.

The man behind the North Carolina pilot is software entrepreneur Chris Evans. After hearing about the Aakash from Valley-based entrepreneur Vivek Wadhwa, Evans agreed to fund 100 tablets for the American non-profit Communities in Schools (CIS), which was running the summer camps in North Carolina. Evans is on the board of CIS. "(The richer kids) were already using smartphones and tablets at school," Evans says, "and I thought the Akash would be an affordable way to keep them in pace with their classmates and engaged with their studies."

Wadhwa is an evangelist for low-cost tablets. He has written extensively in the Washington Post, ForeignPolicy.com, and elsewhere, about their potential to transform education. He also saw the Aakash "as a way to force US tablet prices to drop - bring in some competition from abroad". Along the way, Wadhwa spoke about the Aakash to Lotus Corp founder Mitch Kapor, Obama's former CTO Aneesh Chopra, and to others including Evans, to bring them on board for different projects involving the low-cost tablets.

The tablets in the pilot shipped with apps mostly developed by New York-based Mango Learning, an educational games venture. Mango's chairman Prakesh Ahuja offered access to their entire suite of apps, including a management and evaluation system that tracks student progress.

The sub-$50 price of the Wi-fi was a game-changer, Evans says, adding that free wi-fi was available in many of the students' neighbourhoods. "We discussed giving the tablets to the students for the pilot, but the staff preferred to keep possession of them to make sure they stayed configured consistently," adding that several parents now want to buy the tablet--even though they all live on public aid.

The Aakash, which costs about $50, was designed and developed by London-based DataWind for India's ministries of human resource development (HRD) and information and communication technology (ICT). About 100,000 units were supplied in the first phase, ending in April 2013, mostly in the form of Aakash 2, a tablet well received even by critics who had panned the first Aakash.

Initially meant for engineering college students at a subsidized $35, the Aakash was to be later given to other students - with ambitious plans of giving them to all 220 million students in India over seven to eight years. That rollout is now planned for 2014, with what the Indian government now calls Aakash 4.

The US isn't the only country with Aakash pilots. DataWind CEO Tuli reports deployments in a half a dozen African countries, Mexico and Afghanistan, spanning NGOs, government departments and UN agencies. Most deployments, he says, are in the hundreds of units, while Mexico and Zambia "are in the range of tens of thousands of units". Wadhwa says those projects are good to have, but for technology, the world looks to the US. "That is why what happens here matters more than anywhere."

"The 2,000 tablets in the US so far reflects the equivalent of just a day of shipments in India for us," Tuli says. "But we've not yet commercially rolled out there. A US rollout could easily exceed a million units in the first year. These initial deployments are in support of NGOs and educational institutions."

(Prasanto K Roy is a technology writer in New Delhi)

230 - Aakash can bridge the growing digital divide - Tehelka

aakash-can-bridge-the-growing-digital-divide

MADHURI SAWANT

2013-08-24 , Issue 34 Volume 10

Sky is the limit Schools where Aakash tablets are in use saw a marked increase in attendance Photo: AFP

Educators have spoken for more than a decade about the need to bridge the digital divide, but the actual implementation of technology in education has failed several times. Precious time slipped by because our educational institutions were slow in responding to a changing world, and restricted the use of computers merely to computer labs, where they have been used only to teach Microsoft Office software by temporarily- appointed computer teachers. Their potential as an actual tool for teachers was never fully explored; IT was never woven into the fabric of education.

The Aakash school pilot project, sponsored by the Ministry of Human Resource Development, aims to test whether the use of Aakash tablets as a teaching and learning device can significantly enhance the quality of education in rural schools. Four village schools located within a 20-km radius of Pandharpur, a temple town in Solapur district of Maharashtra, were chosen as the site. At first glance, they did not look all that impressive. But the 1 Gbps connection, provided by the National Knowledge Network, and the well-placed access points in the classrooms, impressed us. It was the right place to start the pilot.

Although the schools have excellent Internet connectivity, power supply is a serious issue in the area. Electricity is essential for the working of servers and therefore the availability of the WiFi network, as well as regular charging of the tablets. The problem was solved by allowing students to take the tablets home for charging, and some content was loaded on their internal memory so that it could be used in offline mode.

Since a major drawback to rural education is the lack of in-depth subject knowledge among teachers, superior content and teacher training were essential for implementing the pilot project. A team from IIT Bombay created high-quality content in Marathi language, and workshops were held to empower teachers in donning the role of facilitator and using the tablet as a teaching device. Though they were slow and reluctant in the beginning, we saw a very good response by the end. Many of them are still confused on how to effectively use the tablet, but a few more training programmes will help in building confidence.

The students, however, showed no such reluctance. We planned to distribute the tablets, which were limited in number, to each student in one Class IX classroom of every school and measure the performance of these students against those from the classes that did not use tablets. But the students were too enthusiastic and curious for that; we finally decided to distribute them to all Class IX students and ask them to share. They were only too happy to do so.

Both the teachers and students were familiar with a few PC-based software, but none of them had seen a tablet before. To our surprise, the students adapted to the technology very fast, much ahead of their teachers. Their familiarity with mobile phones helped. Within a few hours, they had explored most of the features of the tablet, which was pre-loaded with the Android Ice Cream Sandwich operating system and lots of open-source content.

A perennial problem of the school system is the unavailability of textbooks at the beginning of the academic year due to delays in printing, as well as the fact that the poor quality of binding means that the books fall apart by the time examinations come around. We solved this problem by providing digitised textbooks, developed using the latest ePub and HTML5 technology, which also help make concepts clearer through interactive lessons. The tablets also have tool tips, which provide additional information on difficult words used in the textbook, as well as an in-built dictionary and translator. Self-assessment quizzes were included at the end of every lesson. Learning and relearning at their own pace will help strengthen the child’s basics and keep them engaged.

The greater engagement was evident in the marked improvement in attendance; even students who left school out of frustration have returned and started taking interest in learning. Handling the tablets has also made students responsible, and sharing them has helped build collaboration skills, listening to others and respect for peers. Students also rigorously follow the rules that were set when they were given the tablets, since unethical use would lead to them losing the tablet permanently. To build collaboration skills further, different projects were assigned to groups, for which they could use all the tablet’s features. Some of these projects were genuinely impressive, and this has even motivated teachers to start designing mathematics and science projects.

After a year-long pilot, we plan to develop a standard process that can be scaled up to an all-India level. Pedagogy can be further improved by creating virtual laboratories for students to carry out experiments and better integrating field work with class lectures. There are also ways in which Aakash can benefit the students’ lives outside the classroom. Considering the prevalence of anaemia and malnutrition among children, we plan to develop health and nutrition modules with the help of experts. Special modules will also be developed for female students to get better understanding of their body and health. There are also plans to develop simple and engaging content and literacy programmes for their parents. Our hope is that the Aakash tablet will emerge as a ubiquitous tool for the entire family.

As the education market grows at a breakneck pace globally, the tablet is enabling a paradigm shift due to its large potential to grow exponentially. Students will get exposed to the latest knowledge and technology. Knowing how to use technology to collect data or relevant material will help students become critical consumers of knowledge.

The utility and potential of the tablet as the ultimate convergence device would cater to the students’ and teachers’ various computing consumption and communication needs. The realisation of self-aptitude and confidence in self-learning would decrease the fear of failure among students. Finally, bringing in the individual pieces of all these initiatives into reality will augur well in fulfilling our long-standing ambition of extending quality education to every nook and corner of this vast nation.

letters@tehelka.com

229 - Forget Aakash; buy the BSNL Penta for Rs 2,499 only

Forget Aakash; buy the BSNL Penta for Rs 2,499 only

By Rahul Gupta, The Mobile Indian, New Delhi, August 1

The BSNL Penta has a capacitive 7 inch display, 1.2 GHz processor and 3G connectivity as well.

Aakash is still one of the cheapest Android tablets in the Indian market but is not readily available. But if you are planning to buy a tablet at throwaway prices, here is a good news for you. The BSNL Penta IS701C tablet, which is usually available for close to Rs 4,000, is now available for just Rs 2,499.

BSNL Penta IS701C is the upgraded version of the IS701R tablet that was launched last year. The Penta IS701C a WiFi-only tablet with Android 4.0.3 operating system, a 1.2 GHz processor and 512 MB of RAM. Its 7 inch capacitive touchscreen has 800 x 600 pixel resolution and 16:9 aspect ratio.

The tablet has a 3000 mAh battery and 4 GB internal memory that can be expanded to 32 GB through a micro SD card. It has a VGA front facing camera and a micro USB port that can be used to connect data card and to charge the device. It has a 3.5 mm jack and for 3G connectivity you can use data dongles or can do so through WiFi.

The offer is available on Tradus.com and users can get the device for Rs 2,499 including free doorstep delivery with the use of coupon code "BPTP500". The tablet carries an official 1 year manufacturer warranty against manufacturing and usage based defects.

228 - India's Aakash 4 tablet to be ready by January 2014 - Rapid TV News

India's Aakash 4 tablet to be ready by January 2014

Rebecca Hawkes | 06-08-2013

The next version of the low-cost tablet Aakash should be available by January 2014, following the finalisation of its specifications by the Indian Government, the Telecom and IT Minister, Kapil Sibal, has announced.

"The generation 4 Aakash is ready, all the specifications are frozen," Sibal told reporters at a telecommunications conference in New Delhi.

Around 12 manufacturers from around the globe are ready to make the Android-based tablet in India, the minister added.

The Directorate General of Supplies and Disposals (DGS&D) will now start the process for orders of the tablet, which is expected to support 4G services, have integrated phone calling, 4GB of in-built storage and Bluetooth connectivity.

The original Aakash, which launched in October 2011, was promoted by the Indian Government as part of an initiative to link 25,000 colleges and 400 universities in an e-learning programme. Produced by British company DataWind, the Aakash was manufactured by the India-based company Quad in Hyderabad.

Read more: India's Aakash 4 tablet to be ready by January 2014 | Rapid TV News http://www.rapidtvnews.com/index.php/2013080629120/india-s-aakash-4-tablet-to-be-ready-by-january-2014.html#ixzz2bMM6aWi5

227 - Aakash 4 release date, specs and price rumours - Know Your Mobile

Aakash 4 release date, specs and price rumours

V.A Kulkarni 03:18, 6 Aug 2013

KYMI rounds up everything that is known and speculated about the low-cost yet highly functional Aakash 4 tablet

The Aakash series of Indian tablets have long been in the news, thought not always for the right reasons. With so many down turns haunting the production of the slate till now, enthusiasts and critics alike are hoping that the new iteration of the tablet, Aakash 4, will take off smoothly and offer its users all the functionality of Android at a very affordable price point.

Aakash 4 may well release in India by the year end. Though the tablet is likely to be priced at around Rs. 3,000 to Rs. 4,000, users like students who are entitled to the slate at a subsidized price might just be able to get their hands on it for as little as Rs. 2,000. If Aakash 4 works releases and works without a glitch, it will give some serious competition to popular low-cost Android tablets in the sub-continent.

Aakash 4 will reportedly run on a quad-core processor, a 4,000 mAh battery and a RAM of 1 GB. It will be powered by Android's 4.2.1 build of the Jelly Bean operating system and pack in 4 GB of internal memory that is externally expandable by up to another 32 GB. Tech enthusiasts are most looking forward to the feature of the slate whereby it can dual-boot Android and Linux (through a microSD card).The latter is to be touch-optimized on the slate.

The latest Aakash tablet is believed to sport a 7-inch LCD display that comes with 5 point multitouch, a resolution of 800 x 480 pixels and a colour depth of 16 bits. The tablet supposedly comes equipped with a 2-megapixel primary rear facing sensor and a secondary front facing 0.3-megapixel snapper with a VGA resolution as well.

Besides Bluetooth and Wi-Fi, Aakash 4 apparently offers users 2G, 3G and 4G connectivity. It might come with two USB ports too. The tablet is estimated to weigh in at around 500g and sport a thickness somewhere in the range of 0.75-inch. The slate is believe to pack in 5 hours of web browsing and 6 hours of e-reading on a single charge. Ideally, the Government of India wants the tablet to be able to bring its charge up from 10 percent to 80 percent in a time span of two hours. The battery should be rated good for 3 hours of 720p video playback as well.

Some of the features of the Aakash 4 like its 4G connectivity are likely to be downsized for the base model of the tablet, the one that is designed for students. In fact, a write-up in the Hindu reveals that a 10-inch version of the slate is also in the works, with the aim to aid students in presentations and readings.

We will be on the lookout for more news about the Aakash 4 tablet - stay with us on KYMI.

226 - Aakash 4 to be available by January 2014: Kapil Sibal - Economic Times

Aakash 4 to be available by January 2014: Kapil Sibal

PTI Aug 2, 2013, 06.45PM IST

(Govt has finalised specifications…)

NEW DELHI: Government has finalised specifications of next version of low-cost tablet Aakash which would be ready by January 2014, Telecom and IT Minister Kapil Sibal said today.

"Yesterday we had meeting on the Aakash. The generation 4 Aakash is ready, all the specifications are frozen," Sibal said while addressing at the Telecom Summit here.

The minister also said that around 12 manufacturers from around the world are ready to make the tablet in India.

"There is no problem in terms of manufacture. In fact lines are ready for manufacture, what they need is orders. Now that specifications are frozen, we hope that the Aakash will be available to the people of India by January 2014," he said.

The Directorate General of Supplies and Disposals (DGS&D) will start the process for orders, he added.

Final specifications of the new Aakash tablet, however, could not be ascertained. As per proposed specifications, the latest version of Aakash should be capable of supporting 4G services, phone calling features, 4 GB in built storage and bluetooth connectivity.

Government had sourced previous version of Aakash tablet for USD 49.98 which translated in to Rs 2,276.

225 - Aakash 4 tablet to be available by January 2014: Kapil Sibal - NDTV

Aakash 4 tablet to be available by January 2014: Kapil Sibal

Press Trust of India, August 02, 2013

Government has finalised specifications of next version of low-cost tablet Aakash which would be ready by January 2014, Telecom and IT Minister Kapil Sibal said Friday.

"Yesterday we had meeting on the Aakash. The generation 4 Aakash is ready, all the specifications are frozen," Sibal said while addressing at the Telecom Summit New Delhi.

The minister also said that around 12 manufacturers from around the world are ready to make the tablet in India.

"There is no problem in terms of manufacture. In fact lines are ready for manufacture, what they need is orders. Now that specifications are frozen, we hope that the Aakash will be available to the people of India by January 2014," he said.

The Directorate General of Supplies and Disposals (DGS&D) will start the process for orders, he added.

Final specifications of the new Aakash tablet, however, could not be ascertained. As per proposed specifications, the latest version of Aakash should be capable of supporting 4G services, phone calling features, 4 GB in built storage and bluetooth connectivity.

(Also see: Proposed Aakash IV technical specifications released for feedback, include 4G support and voice calling)

Government had sourced previous version of Aakash tablet for USD 49.98 which translated in to Rs. 2,276.

For the latest technology news and reviews, like us on Facebook or follow us on Twitter and get the NDTV Gadgets app for Android or iOS.

224 - Aakash 4 coming in January next year: Kapil Sibal

Aakash 4 coming in January next year: Kapil Sibal

By Anil Satapathy, The Mobile Indian, New Delhi, August 02, 2013 

Category: Tablet

Three previous versions of Aakash were not that successful.

The 4th generation of much controversial Aakash tablet, to be named as Aakash 4, will be available in January next year, according to Communication and Information Technology Minister Kapil Sibal.

"Aakash 4's specification has been freezed. Twelve players have globally shown interest to manufacture it. It will available in January 2014," said the minister while addressing in the Indian Telecom Summit organised by CIII in Delhi today.

Acknowledging the problems associated with previous versions Aakash tablet, Sibal said, "I am battling for success of Aakash. It has been my dream to make Aakash a success story"

Aakash is first in a series of Android-based tablet computers promoted by Government of India as part of an initiative to link 25,000 colleges and 400 universities in an e-learning program. Three versions of Aakash have so far been made but none of them have achieved much success despite the immense euphoria generated in the masses due to their low price tag.

The first Aakash tablet was launched in December 2011 but its manufacturer, Datawind, failed to meet the tablets' demand. Last November, two versions of the tablet - Aakash 2 which is also known as UbiSlate 7Ci and Aakash 3 aka UbiSlate 7C+ - were launched but did not meet much success as many other manufacturers have also brought their equally cheap tablets to the market by then.

Last month, the Government of India made public the proposed specifications of Aakash 4 tablet. As per the government notification, the tablet must have a 7 inch LCD display with "atleast” 800x480 pixels resolution. Also, the display should have minimum five point touch capacity. Most of the tablets under Rs 5,000 have such resolution.

Also, as per the government, the tablet should have the latest Android operating system. For instance, if it is launched now it should have Android 4.2.1 Jelly Bean version. But it does not end there as the government has also specified that the tablet should come with dual bootable (through external SD card) Ubuntu operating system.

To make the tablet run smoother, Aakash IV would be fitted with a minimum of 1 GB DDR3 RAM - which is significant as most of the under Rs 5,000 tablet these days comes 512 MB RAM. It would also have minimum of 4 GB internal memory and a 32 GB micro SD card slot.

As per the proposal, the Aakash IV should come with WiFi (b/g/n), Bluetooth 2.1 or higher version, 3.5 mm jack, USB port and it should support all popular 2G/3G/4G phone/data connectivity dongles in India, USB to Ethernet adaptors, USB printers, mouse, and keyboard. "SD Card interface should support NFC based SD card," the notification further added.

223 - After Aakash, government planning sub-$100 smartphones-TOI

After Aakash, government planning sub-$100 smartphones

Kalyan Parbat, ET Bureau | Aug 2, 2013, 11.09 AM IST

KOLKATA: The government is exploring plans to develop and sell sub-$100 smartphones to Indians to drive the country's broadband push, a top telecom department official said.

The plan comes despite an indifferent market response to Aakash , the world's cheapest tablet aimed to empower students.

But the plan to locally manufacture the smartphones to make them affordable to large sections of the Indian population would complement the government's recent move to woo the electorate ahead of next year's general elections by giving a cellphone to one female member of every household that has worked for 100 days in 2012 under a rural employment guarantee scheme.

"A fully-functional smartphone is no longer an object of desire but an instrument of empowerment ," the official said. He added that since smartphone affordability remains the biggest hurdle to broadband penetration in India, the world's second largest mobile phone market, the government is exploring ways to encourage the biggest handset makers to produce sub- $100 advanced smartphones on a large scale that will come pre-loaded with the latest entertainment applications and also support mobile banking, telemedicine, education to even farming applications like e-krishi .

The proposal was discussed on July 29 during the first meeting of the joint working group on broadband that is co-chaired by the department of telecommunication's (DoT) additional secretary, Rita Teotia, and ex-Nasscom chief, Kiran Karnik, who currently heads the Confederations of India's Industry's telecom advisory cell.

Flooding the market with low cost "Made In India" smartphones is at the heart of the government's plans to evolve a broadband ecosystem to leverage the Rs 21,000-crore national fiber optic network (NOFN) that goes live next year.

The NOFN will be the principal connectivity backbone for taking internet to the hinterlands to achieve the national target of 175 million broadband users by 2017, compared to a modest 11 million now.

Karnik declined to reveal specifics but said: "A sub-$100 smartphone can be a major broadband driver, especially since large scale penetration will have to be propelled by mobile phones" . Two people present in the meeting , however, said there was an overwhelming view that "industry and government needed to work jointly to make smartphones more affordable" .

This, mainly since the average global price of such devices continued to hover around $130 (Rs 7,800), the main reason why barely 5% of the Indian population has till date upgraded to genuine smartphones despite the country's 70 %-plus telecom penetration levels.

Skeptics, however, argue that low cost alone will not spur mobile phone-driven broadband usage. Shiv Putcha, principal analyst (consumer services) at consultancy firm Ovum said the government needed to develop a broadband ecosystem by working with industry to undertake mass mobile content and applications development in local languages to encourage people living in the hinterlands to use the mobile platform to go online.

He added that India needs to develop a full manufacturing ecosystem along the lines of the Chinese city of Shenzhen, where all involved in the value chain of mobile manufacturing - from the cellphone components/chipset suppliers to the design and display people to the testing and engineering people all work within a common industrial cluster.

Mahesh Uppal, a director at telecoms consultancy firm Com First India, believes broadband penetration will not take off "unless the government explores ways to improve smartphone economies of scale through a combination of regulation and marketing efforts" .