Journalism of Courage
Spoken English lessons over mobile phones,football you can kick about on a digitally projected floor,bolt-on kits to enhance performance and comfort of your car. These are not just ideas but actual products some companies in the Pune-Mumbai region have on offer. The products are finding takers,too,including telecom major like Tata Indicom.
The products were showcased in the 6th edition of Proto.in,an initiative by Knowledge Foundation,on Saturday.
English Seekho,is a telephone-based tutor where a user calls a premium phone number and the speech recognition engine imparts a course in basic spoken English. We launched it in collaboration with ILFS-ETS. It took us six months to develop the product technically. Tata Indicom recently launched it nationwide, said Abinash Tripathy,advisor of Enterux Solutions Pvt Ltd,a Mumbai-based firm planning to shift to Pune.
The four-member Enterux team that developed the product is also working on more products on the mobile platform and are in talks with several telecom service providers. English Seekho is now being offered at a subscription of Rs 20 per month and 60 paise per call. We are developing products on the same platform for agriculture,rural healthcare,AIDS awareness and pre-primary education, said Abinash.
Pune-based Touch-Magix Media Pvt Ltd has come up with interactive media products that have caught the interest of many like Ishanya Mall in Pune and Oberoi Mall in Mumbai. Of the three products,one is Magixfloor,an interactive floor where the content is projected by a regular PC or projector. One can play,walk or interact with the content projected on the floor, said Anup Tapadia of Touch-Magix.
The two-year-old firm of 12 members launched the product last January and their clients include event companies,malls,direct customers and even a temple. A Jain temple in Aurangabad installed our interactive flower-based application. We are getting queries from customers wanting to install it at homes. The other product is Magixwall that turns wall surface or a back projected display into a multi-point interactive surface. Magixtable is an interactive tabletop that turns any ordinary board into an exciting interactive board, said Tapadia.
Yet another product from Automotive Robotics comprises performance-enhancing kits for vehicles and costs between Rs 30,000 and Rs 3 lakh. These bolt-on kits enhance the engine and suspension performance and even driving comfort. They involve lots of electronic equipment and are cost effective, said Rajeev Ranadive,proprietor,Automotive Robotics.
