Vodafone’s ‘Be Smart’ mobile internet initiative will target users with mobile applications.

Telecom giant Vodafone today unveiled a new campaign saying it will launch competitively priced mobile Internet packs as it looks to increase base of its 3G users in Mumbai circle. About 47 per cent of smartphone users from our subscriber base are 3G users. So, there is still a large number of users, who have smartphones but have not moved to 3G,” Vodafone India Business Head (Mumbai) Arvind Vohra told reporters here.

The focus of ‘Be Smart’ mobile Internet initiative is to tap the remaining 53 per cent and drive high speed 3G adoption, he added. According to estimates, there are about 2 million Vodafone subscribers in Mumbai who use smartphones.

After a price war for offering the cheapest call rates, telecom operators are now aggressively pushing data services, especially 3G. Many operators, including Airtel, Vodafone and Reliance have already slashed usage charges to get more subscribers to consume data.

“Mumbai Circle generates the highest data revenue in the country amongst all operators. For us, revenues from 3G services are growing at the rate of 12-14 per cent (month on month basis). We are expecting to grow this by another couple of percentage points,” Vohra said.

Under Vodafone’s ‘Be Smart’ mobile internet initiative, the operator will reach out to customers talking about popular mobile applications like videos and music, navigation, social networking, online gaming and live stock market updates.

“The idea is to engage with the consumers to communicate that smartphones are incomplete without Vodafone 3G, in a stimulating and interesting manner. It talks of the relevance and association of 3G to smartphones and will enable users to get the maximum out of their handset,” Vohra said. Vodafone has also launched mobile internet packs starting from Rs 44 (175 MB data for 7 days) for Mumbai customers to induce usage of 3G services, he added. The initiative is currently available only in the Mumbai circle. Vodafone India has over 6.5 million customers in the circle.