How Nokia became the #1 music player in India

Nokia recently launched at an extravagant do at Amby Valley OVI Music
Unlimted (OMU), a bank of 4 mn legal digital tracks, including 1 mn Indian
songs, the latest and largest catalog available to to music buffs free for a
year. This makes Nokia Indias biggest music company in terms of the number and
variety of songs that we are offering, said D Shivakumar, MD, Nokia India.

Consumers who buy a Nokia Ovi Music Unlimited enabled device will be able to
download millions of tracks for free, direct to their mobile phones or to their
PCs from the Ovi Music Store for twelve months. And they will get to keep all
their downloaded music forever. Tracks can also be shared between OMU users via
Bluetooth technology. New songs by major labels will also be available when
released in India.

However, there is a catch. This service will be available only on a select
set of model (X2, X6, 5800 XM, 5530, 5235 and 5130), and after a year if the
user wants to renew the service he will have to buy a new phone. Their existing
phone will not support this service.

Speaking at the announcement, noted movie director and producer Rakeysh
Omprakash Mehra said, I hope technolgy will soon enable such services for
movies too. The new service, created specifically for the Indian market, will
offer more than four million tracks from across nineteen genres including Rock,
Rap, Hip-hop, Pop, Bollywood, Sufi, Indipop, Indian Classical, Devotional,
Ghazals, Malayalam, Tamil, Gujarati, Bengali, Punjabi and Bhojpuri, amongst
others. Shivakumar also added that this service will also address key
challenges of accessibility, affordability and piracy that have existed around
music consumption.

According to Elizabeth Schimel, global head of Music and Connected
Entertainment, Nokia, In partnership with major global labels and more than 150
local music labels and publishers, the service offers the richest choice of
local music paired with tracks from major international artists, creating the
largest catalog of its kind in India.

India is the 30th market to launch this service after the recent launches in
China and Indonesia. The service will include catalogs from major global
labels--Universal Music Group, Sony Music Entertainment, Warner Music Group and
EMI Music. Nokias local partnership with the Indian Music Industry (IMI) brings
a consortium of more than 150 music companies; Hungama, that represents major
labels including Yash Raj, Tseries, Eros; and SIMCA (South Indian Music
Companies Association) amongst others.

The service is free for one year, but Nokia is looking at lots of revenue
possibilities, besides new phones that users will have to buy if they want to
renew their service. According to Shivakumar, According to a recent KPMG survey
of Indian youth, for 83% of respondents music is as essential as food and air,
and 39% respondents wanted music on their mobile phones. The survey also
reveals that over 80% of the respondents are okay to recieve ads if they get
music free. Similarly, if Nokia starts to charge for downloading songs and there
are enough buyers, once the free period offer is over, it could be the biggest
music company in India in terms of revenues too.

To address poor broadband penetration and low PC access, Ovis client size
has been reduced from 60 Mb to 3 Mb, and sharing music through Bluetooth is
possible amongst members.

Nokia also announced the launch of Nokia X2, the latest Ovi Music Unlimited
enabled music phone. Designed for young music lovers, the Nokia X2 comes with
dedicated music keys and 3.5mm AV connector, FM radio with built-in antenna, a
digital music player and loud stereo speakers for sharing music. Plus Nokia X2
offers a 5 megapixel camera with flash and a video recorder. Priced at a little
over Rs 5,000, the Nokia X2 will be available in India during the third quarter
of 2010.

Ibrahim Ahmad

ibrahima@cybermedia.co.in