Three hundred million and still counting, at a rate of 10 million every month... these are current estimates of the mobile subscriber base in India and its monthly growth rate, respectively,. With such a huge readily available client base, you could very well argue that mobile commerce is bound to be the next big opportunity for Indian techies. But are these subscribers really ‘ready' for mobile commerce, in the true sense of what the word means?

Indian mobile users: a ready client base?
M.N. Srinivasu, co-founder & director, BillDesk, is not too bullish about Indian subscribers being ready for mobile commerce. He points out that as long as the average customer uses a prepaid mobile connection with a balance of less than Rs 100 on a handset that is not Web-enabled, mobile commerce is certainly not a sector on the verge of a major explosion. "Given this reality, I'd say that the potential for mobile commerce has been hyped. So assuming that this sector will turn out to be a huge draw in the immediate future, does not make sound business sense," he feels.

That said, it is not as though mobile commerce is a lost cause. Srinivasu notes that the RBI has recently released fairly extensive guidelines for banks desiring to engage in mobile banking and payments, which is a step in the right direction. Of course, it is still up to the banks to convert these guidelines into a secure framework prior to rolling out mobile services.

Since there is a massive potential in mobile commerce (given India's huge subscriber base), banks are believed to be working overtime on coming out with solutions that would help consumers do more with their handsets. But simultaneously, Indian techies also need to identify areas that would significantly benefit from mobile commerce applications, as well as overcome the security challenges the sector is facing.

Identify ‘real' problems
Pointing out how developed countries have used mobiles to automate simple, yet essential functions like paying for car parking space - just flash your mobile in front of a gadget as you drive into a parking lot - Srinivasu believes the way forward in India depends on how clearly we can define problems that are better solved by mobile commerce. India's abundance of cheap labour, for instance, makes the use of mobile phones for car parking useless, as the same task is more inexpensively and efficiently done by making a payment to a municipal corporation worker.

Even booking movie or flight tickets using a mobile phone, Srinivasu feels, has limited user-appeal, since it's a niche ‘high-end' service. ""The reality is that only a very small percentage of the approximately 300 million mobile subscribers in India use
Web-enabled services through their handsets," he says.

Arun Prabhudesai, founder CEO, Hover.in points out that eEven when users have already decided what movie to watch (or which flight to take) and choose to book tickets via SMS, they still have to remember the short code for the transaction. So, the process is not really that user-friendly.

Indian techies, therefore, need to identify more pressing issues that may be solved using a mobile phone and also work towards developing secure user-friendly transaction interfaces.

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Techies in the mobile space
Do you wish to enter the mobile technology space? According to Alap Ghosh, business head, Activemedia Technology, "The real motivation for developers to move to mobile technology should be the desire to work in a niche segment that is still unpopulated. They should also have the will to build technology that potentially has millions of users, and should possess a keen inclination towards being inventively brilliant. Budding mobile technologists can go in either of the following two directions - on-device applications and operator grade technologies. On-device technologies like J2ME/Java 2 Micro Edition, BREW (binary runtime environment for wireless), the iPhone SDK (software development kit) and Android SDK help developers make applications that work on mobile devices with or without connectivity. Operator grade technologies, which are implemented more on the server side with operators or large-scale application providers, use mediums like SMS, voice and WAP (wireless application protocol) to communicate with and provide functionality to mobile devices or interfaces with large-scale service and billing systems. Popular technologies in this space are J2EE (Java 2 Platform, Enterprise Edition) with JSP/JavaServer Pages and PHP (PHP:hypertext preprocessor)."

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User-friendly applications
If mobile commerce is to be expanded in India, mobile transactions also need to be made a lot easier. Currently, Prabhudesai notes that users are required to download a separate m-commerce solution for different kinds of mobile transactions. So, as long as users are conducting one type of transaction by mobile, their task is easy. But engaging in several types of mobile commercial transactions could require them to switch between multiple applications, which could be quite bothersome. He therefore cites the creation of a unified single gateway application that will allow mobile users to pay for multiple types of transactions at one place, as the biggest opportunity in the segment right now.

Being user-friendly extends beyond just user convenience, and encompasses an application that is safe to use, and which protects the user from malicious elements. "Even when users get the hang of using their mobiles for the kind of commercial transactions that are currently possible, most subscribers remain pitiably unaware of the dangers of this platform.

"You may well have users who, is unable to successfully complete a transaction over the electronic interface, approach a helpdesk. When asked what details they've or she fed, they may innocently share critical details like a PIN number or credit card CVV (card verification value) details. Confidentiality is just as important in this space as in Internet banking. Insofar as technology is concerned, it is fairly secure. However, instances of customer data being compromised occur because customers, to a large extent, are still not aware of phishing and spamming, and end up sharing critical information that is used to compromise their accounts. To this end, a mobile commerce technology solution must be built in a user-friendly manner, so as to minimise the possibility of a client suffering a loss while using it," explains Srinivasu.

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Opportunities for tech start-ups in the mobile space
Building mobile data-encryption technologies.
Building a unified single gateway application that will allow mobile users to pay for multiple transactions at one place.
Building solutions that use a single short code to receive SMS requests for different kinds of alerts/information, which are again delivered by SMS.

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More power to the mobile
The fact is that using a mobile for do routine tasks has several benefits - most importantly, it offers a user 24x7, anywhere-anytime access. Users may be ignorant of security issues, but will still rush to make the most of the opportunity to flaunt their handsets in public!

Further, as mobile Internet speeds increase , the potential of mobile commerce is bound to increase. It's no wonder then that Prabhudesai cites companies like ngpay, Paymate or mCheck that already have (or are creating) solutions for seamless payments through mobile phones. It is time Indian techies put on their thinking caps or the m-commerce revolution might just pass them by.