It is probably for the first time that Sun is trying to monetize Java directly with it's JavaFX Mobile software. Sun has previously attacked this market with Mobile Interface Device Profile (MIDP) with success but has lead to a fragmented market with huge incompatibility problems. If JavaFX delivers on the promise of solving these incompatibility problems, it will bring down costs of mobile phone app s/w. This has very interesting possibilities for ecommerce (I know it's not fashionable anymore :-)) in countries like India, where the gap between PC penetration and mobile penetration is huge.

Consumer Internet Digital divide

Check out this innovative concept of drive by WiFi being pioneered by United Villages. They offer email in Indian villages for as low as 1 Re per email (1 Rs is 2.2 cents approx). It might sound ridiculous to charge for email itself. But remember we are talking of remote and isolated villages here with no regular form of connectivity. This reminds me of C.K.Prahalad's Fortune at the Bottom of the Pyramid. Let us do a quick economics check on this model:
Population of Indian villages :                                             718910672.9
Hypothetical internet penetration percentage in villages :  .05 %  (3.5 % is the all India figure ).
Hypothetical number of emails in a month/person        :   2 
Annual Revenue                                                      :  $ 18.9 Million (assuming 2.2 cents per email).
This is just revenue from email alone. A whole host of value added services can be brough to the table once the basics are in place. I don't know what the cost structure of this model is but seems interesting at first glance. Would love to know what you think ? Is this a money spinner or will it fall flat like the Simputer ?


PS: John Roese, CTO Nortel, has an interesting viewpoint that while we enter an era of hyper connectivity, we need to keep the economic and social impact of the connection in mind lest we actually start worsening the digital divide. Consumer Internet Digital divide Indian Business Life

Business Week brings up PC recycling as a way to bridge the digital divide. We also have more radical approaches like the Simputer innovation. Both approaches have their pros and cons like anything else, but I tend to favor reuse and "value engineered" innovation over radical innovation when it comes to bridging the digital divide. Here's why:


The stupendous importance of the platform: Making a radical innovation like a new platform succeed in the face of an existing, proven and mature option is a staggering task. Just ask any company that Microsoft has vanquished to know why.  


Ecosystem versus devices:  The question really is not access to devices but access to the ecosystem where there is information.The idea should be to find the path of least resistance to get the underprivilegded into the information rich ecosystem. An outdated PC with a local language version of Windows running just IE running would provide a much easier entry point than new devices or software.


Leveragability of the learning curve: Why bridge one divide to create another ? Why make a 'digital illiterate' learn a new device only to find that he is handicapped when it comes to what the rest of the world is doing ?

The human factor: Which CEO would not want to get rid of "junk" PC's for a noble cause ? Knowing that your junk can irrevocably and surely change someone's like for the better is a strong incentive. Meanwhile try selling a new, untested and radical innovation to the same CEO he will ask for a business plan.  

Think local when it comes into innovation: Innovation should be value engineered with the objective of reducing the cost of entry by leveraging local strengths. The wind up laptop is a good example. I will say take a PC and find a way to use a gobar gas plant to run it before taking it to an Indian village. The example is extreme but the message is clear, think local when it comes to innovation.
 

Digital divide Innovation