IDEA Cellular chooses Nokia Intelligent Content Delivery to become India’s 1st operator to charge differentially for data services.

IDEA Cellular, a leading mobile operator in India, and Nokia, the world leader in mobile communications, have launched Nokia’s Intelligent Content Delivery System (ICD) solution on all IDEA’s mobile networks across India. The Nokia ICD solution enhances IDEA’s mobile packet core network capabilities and enables it to connect both prepaid and post-paid subscribers to data services and charge them according to the value of traffic and content. This makes IDEA India’s first and only operator to charge differentially for data services, thereby increasing its revenue streams.

Nokia ICD solution allows IDEA to provide data services, such as downloadable ringtones, music, games, browsing, streaming, MMS and content based SMS, to both prepaid and post-paid customers and charge for them differentially.

“IDEA has always been at the forefront of providing innovative data services to its customers by leveraging the latest technologies. We have taken another significant step in that direction by charging online for data services for our prepaid customers. Data services usage is on the rise and it was important to not only extend data services to prepaid customers but also charge customers differentially depending on the importance of the service for them,” said Vikram Mehmi, CEO, IDEA Cellular. “Nokia’s technology combined with strong systems integration capabilities made Nokia the natural choice as we enhance our service machinery to support our increasing data services offering.”

Systems integration of the Nokia solution to IDEA’s existing network environment (Multivendor Integration) and specific customization are key part of the agreement. In addition, Nokia provides IDEA with a comprehensive set of services, including delivery services, Help Desk, software maintenance and emergency support.

“The Nokia ICD solution deployment for IDEA is the first of its kind in the Indian telecom market, and is a strategic step in the Nokia - IDEA relationship. This is the first deployment of the Nokia ICD solution in India and Nokia is the sole supplier of such a solution for IDEA across all its networks,” said Ashish Chowdhary, Country Head, Networks, Nokia India. “The Nokia ICD solution will enable IDEA to drive greater revenues from its data services offering to its customers.”

The Nokia ICD solution is a network based centralized service and content control system, which enables operators to analyze, charge and manage services in a flexible manner. The Nokia ICD solution helps the operator provide highly segmented services for different subscriber groups, providing advanced tools for service and subscription profiling and management, as well as for charging and access differentiation. All services can be charged either offline as postpaid or online from the user’s prepaid account. Nokia has over 48 references for the Nokia Intelligent Content Delivery.