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Aakash Gets 3 Lakh Pre-Booking Orders
By siliconindia
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Monday, 21 November 2011, 23:54 IST
Bangalore: The world's cheapest tablet Aakash which costs less than 
3000 has received about 3 lakh pre-launch booking for the commercial version. Aakash's retail bookings exceed India's estimated 250,000 tablet marked dominated by Apple, Samsung and Reliance.
Suneet Singh Tuli, CEO of Datawind said, "The bookings for Aakash have been done without any money received in advance. We have identified an operator for a data plan at 99 a month." He also claimed that the data streaming technology offered by his company could make internet access costs virtually free.
"We hope to make internet free on our devices with that technology." Tuli is experimenting with a technology that can stream a 700MB file compressed into a 25MB on a tablet. Aircel could be the likely operator, said executives of the two companies.
Datawind has supplied about 10,000 tablets to the government's National Mission for Education at a price of Rs 2,250. The devices are being used by students from colleges such as the IITs, RECs, BITS Pilani, Teri University and others. He also said, subsidized model of this tablet, made by UK-based Datawind, is already being distributed free in schools and colleges.
"About 185 million new handsets are sold in India this year. But the number of tablets to be sold in a year would be in the range of 250,000 to 500,000 units." The low price is attractive only for students and the youth, who are aspiring to buy new products, he said.
Aakash, in its next version, will be upgraded with a capacitive touch screen and a processor with double the speed. Datawind plans to supply an attachable 400 keyboard, turning the device into PC-lookalike at 3,400.
Considering the proposal, government procures the next version of tablet called Aakash 2 with faster 700 MHz processor and network provider are also gearing up to offer cheaper data plans on tablets.
3000 has received about 3 lakh pre-launch booking for the commercial version. Aakash's retail bookings exceed India's estimated 250,000 tablet marked dominated by Apple, Samsung and Reliance.
Suneet Singh Tuli, CEO of Datawind said, "The bookings for Aakash have been done without any money received in advance. We have identified an operator for a data plan at 99 a month." He also claimed that the data streaming technology offered by his company could make internet access costs virtually free.
"We hope to make internet free on our devices with that technology." Tuli is experimenting with a technology that can stream a 700MB file compressed into a 25MB on a tablet. Aircel could be the likely operator, said executives of the two companies.
Datawind has supplied about 10,000 tablets to the government's National Mission for Education at a price of Rs 2,250. The devices are being used by students from colleges such as the IITs, RECs, BITS Pilani, Teri University and others. He also said, subsidized model of this tablet, made by UK-based Datawind, is already being distributed free in schools and colleges.
"About 185 million new handsets are sold in India this year. But the number of tablets to be sold in a year would be in the range of 250,000 to 500,000 units." The low price is attractive only for students and the youth, who are aspiring to buy new products, he said.
Aakash, in its next version, will be upgraded with a capacitive touch screen and a processor with double the speed. Datawind plans to supply an attachable 400 keyboard, turning the device into PC-lookalike at 3,400.
Considering the proposal, government procures the next version of tablet called Aakash 2 with faster 700 MHz processor and network provider are also gearing up to offer cheaper data plans on tablets.