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- Aircel, Rcom Might Resort to Liquidation After NCLAT Decision: Report
- Indians Want Homegrown Apps More Than Ever: Satya Yerramsetti
- Verizon 5G Business Internet Services Deployed in 21 New U.S. Cities
- Airtel Payments Bank Will Allow Maximum Balance of Rs 2 Lakh
- AT&T Wins the 5G Network Race in the US: Report
- BSNL Bharat Fibre vs JioFiber 300 Mbps Plan, Which Is Better
| Aircel, Rcom Might Resort to Liquidation After NCLAT Decision: Report Posted: 18 Apr 2021 09:08 AM PDT
Last week, The National Company Law Appellate Tribunal (NCLAT) announced its verdict in the Aircel vs the Department of Telecommunications (DOT) case. The verdict had a direct effect on the resolution plans of Aircel and Reliance Communication Ltd. (RCom) The resolution plan of UV Asset Reconstruction Company Ltd. (UVARCL) for Aircel was approved in June 2020. However, according to an IANS report, experts believe that NCLAT’s decision has rendered the plans useless, thus pushing the company towards liquidation. The company will be filing for liquidation for Rs 18,000 crore owed to the lenders with zero reimbursements. Banking Institutions Will Incur The Most LossThe Banking institutions will suffer a huge loss because of the decision. First on the list is the State Bank of India (SBI) with a loss of Rs 5,000 crore followed by Bank of Baroda, Canara Bank, Punjab National Bank and China Development Bank. UVARCL also has biddings on assets of RCom and RTL which primarily include spectrum and real estate. NCLAT has said in the last week’s judgement that the company can use or transfer spectrum only after the government dues are cleared. Further, the ruling also said that Spectrum cannot be treated as a “security” and the government will be viewed as an operational creditor. DoT being an operational creditor cannot claim any amount towards AGR dues before the financial creditors. Aircel and RCom are indebted to pay Rs 12,389 crore and Rs 26,000 crore respectively to the DoT as AGR dues. The NCLAT’s ruling will also affect the debt resolution of Reliance Communication Ltd (RCom) and Reliance Telecom Ltd (RTL). RCom’s and RTL’s resolution plan was approved by 100 per cent by the lenders but it is still expecting approval from NCLT Mumbai, since March 2020. RCom and RTL’s liquidation will result in losses to 38 lenders which is estimated to be about Rs 40,000 crore. China Development Bank will lose about Rs 9,000 crore, SBI about 3,000 crores and LIC Rs 3,700 crore. Sources are alleging that the Committee of Creditors for Aircel and RCom is going to appeal before the Supreme Court and will strive for a favourable ruling from the apex Court. |
| Indians Want Homegrown Apps More Than Ever: Satya Yerramsetti Posted: 18 Apr 2021 05:30 AM PDT
Driven by the 'Aatmanirbhar Bharat' and 'Vocal for Local' initiatives by the government, Indian users are looking for local alternatives for some of the major apps such as WhatsApp and more. Being one of the most populous countries in the world, India's app developers stand a good chance to gain ground and name not only in the sub-continent but worldwide. Satya Yerramsetti, founder and CEO, Telebu, shares views on the same. How are home-grown apps gaining prominence in tier-2 & tier-3 cities?India is one of the largest application markets across the globe, and it has been growing significantly over the years. As highlighted by Adjust, a mobile distribution and analytics company, in its report titled Essential insights for 2021, 19 billion-plus apps were downloaded in 2019 as compared to over six billion in 2016. Another major trend that is picking up pace in the app market in India is the increasing prominence of homegrown apps, specifically in tier 2 and tier 3 cities. The nationwide ban on Chinese goods and services further drove the growth of domestic apps, and users now prefer Indian mobile applications owing to the credibility and the local flavour. Additionally, initiatives like Atmanirbhar and 'vocal for local' have also contributed in giving the required push to the ‘desi tech’ space, and it has been growing louder than ever. There is a new revolution of producing and preparing everything locally, be it goods or services, applications, payment gateways, e-commerce platforms, or content creation services, gaming platforms, etc. In the present times, the domestic versions rule the application market in India and have been exhibiting remarkable growth. As reported by Apps Flyer, one of the global leaders in mobile attribution and marketing analytics, India's app market constituted 38.5% of the global mobile application market, surpassing China and the US in 2020. There were approximately 7.3 billion app installations that happened in 2020. It further states that mobile consumption witnessed a surge amongst the consumers of tier 2, 3, and 4 cities primarily for finance, gaming, and entertainment apps. This pushes the demand for regional content as well, which can be sufficed by the homegrown applications owing to the local flavour and geographical proximity. How have WhatsApp's latest policy amendments created a fear psychosis of personal information getting accessed by Big Tech Companies? Will this privacy uncovered fallout lead users and enterprises to resort to other apps?The recent policy changes introduced by WhatsApp have caused havoc in the communication industry. While WhatsApp was the most commonly used platform for our personal communications since the beginning, it has now started setting foot into the business space too. Amidst this, the recent policy amendments are a little cause of concern for individual users as well as the enterprises who actively rely on WhatsApp for their business communications. Now when people are looking for alternatives, the options available in the market are quite limited. Most enterprises use customer communication chat platforms, including WhatsApp, Signal or Telegram, to discuss, collaborate and share business information. And most of the times, the information shared by the enterprises is confidential in nature. Documents, Files, Reports, and pretty much everything under the sun is usually shared on these platforms, including WhatsApp, Signal or Telegram. In today's modern world, where information is the new currency, organisations must safeguard business secrets, data and control information dissemination across organisations. TelebuPing solves just that. TelebuPing is an Enterprise First Chat Platform meant to protect, safeguard, and secure enterprises' business communication. The prominent features of TelebuPing include:
While apps like WhatsApp, Telegram and Signal collect user information, including purchase history, location, contact, email address and the likes, our product TelebuPing, does not collect unnecessary data or requests access to any information from organisations or users. Rather, all chats, data, documents and information on TelebuPing is stored on Ping Cloud Server (3rd Party – AWS) locally. These servers are not accessible to anyone at Telebu's end apart from the account's business owner (Organisation) by getting explicit consent from the organisation. What's the role of apps like TelebuPing in the Global Communication Market when the world is looking for alternate options amid WhatsApp privacy issues?Well, I firmly believe that apps like TelebuPing have a significant role in the Global Communication Market, especially now when the world is confused, scared, and a little clueless amid WhatsApp's concerns. TelebuPing is an educator and a thought leader. As a product, brand and organisation, the first step is to educate the users (businesses) where TelebuPing comes to our aid. TelebuPing is transparent in its communication process, informs the users about the challenges, problems and risks involved. Furthermore, TelebuPing shares ways in which they can protect their data, informs them about the nuances of app permissions, settings, and privacy. TelebuPing functions like a gateway for secured enterprise communications. As a product, it puts enterprises first, providing them with complete control of the App. Every conversation, interaction, chat, phone call or video meeting that takes place on TelebuPing is stored locally and is accessible to the enterprise. Apart from this, the key problems TelebuPing solves for businesses include:
How is TelebuPing now slowly becoming India's First Company offering the one-stop solution for all the communication needs?Right from the inception, our vision was to be the first CaaS (Communication as a Service) company that serves both enterprise & customer communication. We flagged off our journey in the enterprise communication space by foraying into Audio Conferencing with Grptalk. Grptalk, one our most trusted products, is a cutting-edge audio conferencing app that allows 3-10,000+ people in <30 seconds. After tasting success with Grptalk, we developed TelebuHub – a Virtual Cloud Office with a built-in CRM that serves as a communication hub for the customers. We further added AI-powered bots to TelebuHub's infrastructure, and that is how TelebuPop came into existence. With TelebuPop, we facilitated the use of live chat and created bot flows to automate responses, offer support, and qualify leads on your websites or app. The next step of evolution included the integration of all social communication channels into the app architecture in order to enable enterprises to access all customer touchpoints through a single platform, resulting in more contextual communications, higher customer satisfaction ratings, faster TATs, fewer tickets, and many more benefits. Then came TelebuJoin, which is a cloud video meeting platform allowing you to connect, discuss and build relationships from anywhere, on the go. Next in line is TelebuPing, our first big step into the UCaaS space. With TelebuPing, one gets an end-to-end encrypted organisational chat platform that keeps the conversations private and lets you connect via Voice or Video over VoIP. And finally, through TelebuBlocks, we foray into the CPaaS space. TelebuBlocks allows the users to build what they want. Under this product, we offer APIs, SDKs & Prebuilt solutions that you can configure, test & iterate. While our current focus area is Enterprise Communications – Audio, Video, Bots, CRM, Ticketing, communication hub, enterprise hardware, cloud, IoT, CPaaS & DaaS, we plan to offer our entire product suite to businesses with single login access over the next few months, thereby completing our transformation into the UCaaS solution provider. What are the long and short-term goals for TelebuPing?Currently, a limited number of customers from our user base use TelebuPing. Hence, to reach out to a larger audience, we are constantly testing, iterating and introducing innovations to the product, which are still in the beta phase. In simpler terms, our short term goal is to onboard 100 organisations (100,000+ users) on TelebuPing. The goal is to offer them an end to end communication experience, be it – Chat, Voice or Video on a single platform. From a product roadmap standpoint, we are looking to add:
From a long term perspective, we would like to challenge the industry leaders like RingCentral, 8 by 8, Microsoft, and Google to become the preferred UCaaS solution providers amongst Enterprise, SMEs, MSMEs & Startups. As per Statista, the UCaaS market is to be about 70 billion USD by 2023. The Current UCaaS market share lies between Microsoft, Cisco, Zoom, RingCentral (55%) & Others (45%). Telebu wants to capture a 10% market share in the others category. We are also planning to target markets that include – Indian Subcontinent, GCC, South East Asia, East Africa & South America. What was the idea behind the launch of Grptalk, TelebuPing, TelebuHub, etc?In 2003, I returned from Australia with a degree and a dream – to start an online business, which would take India into the dotcom age. I soon gathered seven people, and SMSCountry Networks was born at a tiny office in Ameerpet. The aim was to make bulk SMS the marketing tool for Indian enterprises. We were pretty successful, and we gradually opened many new branches across India, and one in Dubai. Riding the SMS wave of success, we launched 160by2.com, an entirely new solution – ads in SMS. Soon our servers were clocking 8,00,00,000 SMS daily. Soon after, we were started offering custom-built APIs and SDKs to customers to integrate SMS capabilities into their native applications. After pioneering Bulk SMS and Voice SMS in India, Telebu began thinking of making conference calls easy. After months of research and innovation, Telebu developed a unified system called the PBFTS (Public Broadcast Feedback & Telephony System). They could send SMS, schedule voice broadcasts, and even initiate calls quickly. This was when we developed the dial-out conference calling method, where the server triggers a call to all the conference participants simultaneously. Our award-winning conference calling App called 'grptalk' works on a dial-out capability, one of the biggest reasons for its widespread adoption and subsequent use. Later on, during the HUDHUD Cyclone that ravaged AP's coast, we deployed a fully functioning call centre to help the AP Government in 12 days. Understanding the need for a call centre setup that can be deployed quickly, we began working on our cloud-hosted call centre software that would unify all call centre essentials and systems into a single-view software solution, and thus TelebuHub, a cloud office platform, was launched. With TelebuHub, run call centres, make outbound calls, offer support, manage contacts via its inbuilt CRM, raise tickers or automate your knowledge management system. In early 2019, we realized that the name SMSCountry led to confusion about our capabilities and not defining our true capabilities. We wanted to break free of the SMS tag, so we rebranded ourselves as Telebu, borrowing from Telecommunication and Business. How Telebu safeguards the privacy and use of personal information provided by users, and how they plan to address the new proposed Identification of 'first originator' of data without affecting the end-to-end encryption offered on Telebu's Products?From a privacy and security standpoint; Telebu, as an organisation that offers encrypted solutions, adheres to all the best practices followed worldwide (Double Opt Ins, GDPR etc.) and does not ask for customer's information or access data and your devices more than it needs to for the products to function properly. Our Customers love us for our minimalistic approach towards data collection, the transparency we provide pertaining to the privacy policies, terms of use, etc. and most importantly, how we keep their data & conversations safe. This is one of the key reasons why large MNCs, Political Parties etc., trust us and work with us. Additionally, we as an organisation use our own product, TelebuPing, to communicate with all our stakeholders. TelebuPing is a communication tool that enables companies to capture all the real-time business interactions on one single platform, and all the conversations are end to end encrypted. |
| Verizon 5G Business Internet Services Deployed in 21 New U.S. Cities Posted: 18 Apr 2021 03:30 AM PDT
Verizon Business has taken a step further in the expansion of its fixed wireless connectivity offering dubbed as 5G Business Internet to 21 new U.S cities. The new offering by Verizon Business leverages the 5G mmWave network as the spine of connectivity which is referred to as 5G Ultra Wideband. As reported by RCR Wireless, the new cities included in the expansion of Verizon's 5G Business Internet are Denver, Dallas, Detroit, Cincinnati, Atlanta, Anaheim, Las Vegas, Indianapolis, Kansas City, Miami, Phoenix, Minneapolis, Salt Lake City, Sacramento, San Diego, San Francisco, San Jose, St. Louis and St. Paul. Verizon Business Customers Will Get Unlimited High-Speed InternetTami Erwin, CEO of Verizon Business, said that as the entity has expanded the 5G Business footprint in new cities, businesses of all types and sizes can access superfast speeds, low latency, stable network and next-generation applications enabled by 5G Ultra Wideband with no data limits or throttling. He further said that Verizon would continue to expand the 5G Business Internet services and offer competitive pricing, flexibility and capability of the entity's full suite of products and services to more businesses all over the country. Verizon 5G Business customers will get unlimited data plans with different internet speed plans. Customers will get the option to pick a 400 Mbps plan to cater to the different needs of their business. The 5G Business Internet service complements the diverse portfolio of network and digital transformation tools developed by Verizon. The portfolio includes impeccable services like 5G mobility and 5G Edge mobile-edge computing (MEC) service, BlueJeans, advance security services, OneTalk voice communications, IoT and other business services. 5G to Create New Opportunities for VerizonVerizon recently conducted a survey along with Morning Consult. The survey revealed some of the upcoming impact of the 5G footprint around the globe. Nearly seven in ten decision-makers that account for nearly 69% said that 5G would help their company in eliminating the negative impact caused by Covid-19. Almost 80% of decision-makers agreed that 5G would open the door to new opportunities for their company. Further, nearly 48% of the participants have already provided and planning to provide 5G-capable smartphone to employees within the next 6 months. |
| Airtel Payments Bank Will Allow Maximum Balance of Rs 2 Lakh Posted: 18 Apr 2021 12:35 AM PDT
Bharti Airtel's e-finance service, Airtel Payments Bank, will now allow users to keep a maximum of Rs 2,00,000 in their accounts which has increased from the earlier maximum limit of Rs 1,00,000. Users will be able to save more with the increased balance allowance. Further, Airtel Payments Bank has become the first payments bank in India to avail such a high limit of day-end balance to the users. All the deposits are secured under the Deposit Insurance and Credit Guarantee Corporation (DICGC), a wholly-owned subsidiary of the Reserve Bank of India (RBI). According to a release from the company, the Airtel Payments Bank has 55 million engaged users. However, as per Sunil Bharti Mittal, it has 15 million monthly active users. The Airtel Payments Bank has a robust network of 5,00,000 neighbourhood banking points present all across India. The banking points enable users to transact money more conveniently. Increased Balance Limit to Enhance Consumer Usage of Airtel Payments BankThe Airtel Payments Bank will see an enhanced consumer usage since the maximum allowance limit has increased. Users will be able to make more transactions in a given time frame since they will be able to keep more money in the account. A few days back, the Reserve Bank of India (RBI) had increased the maximum limit of money users could keep in their payments bank savings account from Rs 1,00,000 to Rs 2,00,000. This gave Airtel the flexibility to increase the maximum limit of balance in its saving account to Rs 2,00,000 as well. The previous limit of Rs 1,00,000 was set through an order released in 2014. The times have changed, and the way people transact money has changed too. Keeping that in mind, the RBI has increased the maximum balance limit for the users. It will help them in making more transactions and let the economy keep up with increased demand for online money transaction services. |
| AT&T Wins the 5G Network Race in the US: Report Posted: 17 Apr 2021 09:50 PM PDT
A report compiled by RootMetrics turned out to be positive for AT&T subscribers. The report revealed that the American telecommunications company is winning the 5G race in the US. RootMetrics new report was linked with testing of 5G network performance across 45 US cities. Apart from AT&T, T-Mobile also received significant recognition in the report. The report shed light on the fact where AT&T has superior 5G download speeds and reliability and T-Mobile has the best 5G network availability. AT&T Led the 5G CompetitionIf you are not aware, the best 5G speed is achieved when a telecom operator provides fast speeds across all the three defined metrics in the same city, which are median, 5th percentile and 95th percentile. RootMetrics considered all the metrics while compiling the report. AT&T not only led the competition in fastest 5G median speed but also clocked on fastest best and worst case 5G download speeds. The report summarised that AT&T delivered robust download speeds with a combination of the fastest worst case, median and best 5G speed in nearly 14 cities. As mentioned in the report, T-Mobile reported the fastest speed across all three metrics in six markets. On the other side, The American multinational communications Verizon reported high speed across the metrics in three markets. RootMetrics also revealed that AT&T delivered a median download speed of 50 to 100 Mbps in 31 markets. T-Mobile and Verizon did the same in 11 and 10 markets, respectively. T-Mobile Offered 5G Services Across 45 CitiesThe report also revealed that T-Mobile was the only telecom operator out of three networks to provide a 5G network in all 45 cities where the test happened. AT&T and Verizon offered 5G services in 44 and 43 cities, respectively. However, AT&T turned out to be a more reliable and stable network than both Verizon and T-Mobile. RootMetrics marked that AT&T, from a market perspective, received 99.5% 5G data reliability. The entity further added that the mid-band spectrum could help telecom operators achieve faster 5G speeds. As telecom operators are adding more C-band spectrum in their pack, users can expect faster speeds soon. |
| BSNL Bharat Fibre vs JioFiber 300 Mbps Plan, Which Is Better Posted: 17 Apr 2021 06:32 PM PDT
Bharat Sanchar Nigam Limited (BSNL) offers customers fiber plans under its broadband arm called Bharat Fibre. The state-run operator is known for providing excellent propositions to its users with its broadband plans. BSNL's fiber broadband plans are as good as plans provided by JioFiber or Airtel Xstream Fiber. Both BSNL Bharat Fibre and JioFiber offer users a 300 Mbps plan. Both the plans have a ton of similarities. Today, we are comparing the 300 Mbps plan from BSNL and JioFiber to determine which is better. Take a look ahead at what we feel is a better option for you. BSNL Bharat Fibre 300 Mbps PlanBSNL offers its 300 Mbps plan for a monthly cost of Rs 1,499. Note that it doesn't include taxes. But the operator also offers it for a yearly validity of Rs 17,988, again exclusive of taxes. The yearly plan offers users an additional month of service. Thus, instead of 12 months, users get a total of 13 months for Rs 17,988 meaning the monthly cost of the plan becomes Rs 1,383. Further, users get 4,000GB of fair-usage-policy (FUP) data with this plan, which is better than what most other operators offer. Post consumption of the FUP data, the speed for the users drop to 4 Mbps. Users can also get an unlimited voice calling connection and an over-the-top (OTT) benefit of Disney+ Hotstar Premium for one year. BSNL calls its 300 Mbps plan 'Fibre Ultra'. JioFiber 300 Mbps PlanJioFiber offers its 300 Mbps plan for a monthly cost of Rs 1,499 (exclusive of taxes). Users can also get the same plan for 3, 6, and 12 months. On purchase of the plan for 1 year, users need to pay Rs 17,988, but they also get the service for another 30 days for free. Essentially, the plan’s monthly price becomes Rs 1,383, which is exactly the same as that of BSNL’s plan. However, the FUP data offered with the JioFiber's 300 Mbps plan is 3,300GB, which is lesser than what BSNL's users get. This plan avails OTT benefits of Netflix, Disney+ Hotstar VIP, Amazon Prime Video, SonyLIV, ZEE5 Premium, Voot Select, Voot Kids, Discovery+, Eros Now, and more. Users can also get a free voice calling facility with the 300 Mbps plan from JioFiber. VerdictBefore going for the differences, let's address the similarities between both the plans. Firstly, both offer their monthly and annual plans for effectively the same cost. Further, there is free voice calling, and users get OTT benefits with either of the plans. Coming to the differences, JioFiber's plan offers more OTT benefits than BSNL's. However, BSNL's 300 Mbps plan offers more FUP data to the users than JioFiber's plan. There are only a few things that are distinguishable between the plans. But these few differences make all the difference when a user is selecting which plan to go with. So, if you want more OTT benefits with your plan, go with JioFiber. But if you want more FUP data in a month, go with BSNL's plan. At last, there is customer service. JioFiber's customer service is more responsive than BSNL's in most regions of the country. |
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