The Indian consumer has reacted far more avidly to ring-tone changes, horoscopes on the web, rahu-kaalam alerts (never mind an explanation, it would need another thousand-word article!) and SMS messages in Hinglish and Tinglish than any market researcher would ever have predicted. And she understands price arbitrage very well. I would wager that in no other country has the fine art of “missed calls”, which are not paid for but which can still be the conduit of important content, been used as expertly and repeatedly as in India. “Give me a missed call and I will understand” is a frequent one-liner heard in India. Be prepared and open to several complicated pricing plans — 100 free incoming calls while travelling, 50 free outgoing SMS messages, one free ring-tone change per month and so on. And then be prepared for a huge number of calls into your call centres to change this service to that one.

Remember, however attractive the individual features of the iPhone, she will pay for these features only over time, only as she decides that they are valuable, not because an advertiser tells her to like them. She will experiment with each feature carefully, drop some and pick up others in the light of complex trade-offs and usage scenarios that would leave the best game-theorists puzzled.

Luckily for the Indian consumer, you are entering a market which is competitive and which does not retain even a residue of our infamous licence-permit Raj. Your competitors include savvy Finnish companies and awesome Korean giants. Your potential partners include the fastest growing mobile phone service providers in the world and some of the most valued companies in financial markets (people have paid real money in recent times at record market capitalisation levels... so this is not just theoretical).

... contd.