In the Internet world, Seth Godin needs little introduction and I am not going to attempt any. All I want to say to my readers is that Mr. Godin is a living legend in blogging, Internet marketing and even in non-fiction writing. I just read his entry titled 'The problem with mobile' in which he has discussed about the matter that except for calling mobile phone industry has yet to use its full potential. When I thought about South Asian countries, I felt that Mr. Godin's assessment is even more relevant to my part of the world.
By 2008, India is going to surpass USA to become the second largest market in terms of mobile phone user base. By the end of 2006, South Asian countries will have a combined user base of over 150 million. However, apart from calling and sending SMS, there is hardly any market for mobile phone contents in South Asia. Very few people actually browse by their mobile phone and even the market of ring tone download is not that big either.
The only good thing is that even in USA, mobile phone content has not developed as expected. So, the content providers in South Asia have real potential not just to develop content for their regional markets but also take an aim to get a share of the US market. I hope the South Asian mobile phone operators and content providers can realize this potential and make the best out of it.
