The low cost PC space is heating up in India and Novatium, the thin client based network after forging a deal with Tata Tele has now partnered with BSNL.
The partnership will enable Novatium to offer Nova netPC enabled with the BSNL broadband.
The key factor that will enable broadband penetration is an affordable computing access device and Nova netPC offers the customers to get home a personal computer at just Rs.2,999 – source
Very recently, Low cost PC provider, NComputing partnered with AP government to provide computing access to 5,000-school educational computing initiative.
In our earlier coverage, Sumanth shared very interesting insights on Novatium:
- The fee quoted does not include the price of a monitor which needs to be purchased separately. So assuming a price of say Rs. 3,000 for a decent monitor, the total price for the capex comes to Rs. 5,499.not much lower than entry-level PCs that retail in the Rs. 10,000 range. Would users perceive the difference to be valuable enough to justify giving up on a full-fledged PC?
- There is a monthly charge that needs to be paid for connectivity.something in the range of Rs. 300 – Rs.400. Now this raises an interesting question – how many folks who are presumably extremely cost-conscious (to justify choosing the NetPC over a regular PC for the Rs. 3.5k difference) would be amenable to paying Rs. 400 per month?! My guess would be none! There is an essential disconnect in the customer profiling model.
- What’s more, this monthly charge only gives the user 30 hours of usage time per month – anything extra requires an additional fee – since the NetPC is useless without connectivity, what they are offering is basically a PC that can be used just for one hour a day!
- Also, the apps that comes for the basic fee are trivial commodity apps like games and media player.anything meaningful like Microsoft Office has an additional fee of Rs. 100 per month.now contrast this to the normal PC seller who is likely to just throw in a pirated copy of Office for free with the purchase!
This project is headed by Prof.Ashok Jhunjhunwala. Check out this talk given by him at Google TechTalks :
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lAjtq92CSOE
It’s a huge 52 min. talk, but trust me, you don’t wanna miss a second of it.
Should have used Open Source to mitigate costs.
Instead of looking at the revenues from monthly rental and giving abysmal 30 hours of connectivity, they should take it from front. No doubt they need a financial backing for this. But that is the starting and end point we can expect. In between number of players will come and go, provide varied values and in the end consumers will have a computer cum phone cum camera cum something-else-may-be at a low cost with advertisement, ->this-medium-based-models fueling its growth and sustaining low cost in return for higher reach and wider network.
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can i get the dealership of this low cost cpu(nova net pc)if yes please send me complete details to my email.
thanking you
regards
ragesh
9445239637
I am a user of NetPc from BSNL and i find comments written above are without even checking out the detail offerings . i really having a great time with the product . why don’t someone from company clarifies these points
Hi Amit,
Since you have a NetPC, why dont you clarify what are teh facts? I am curious to know the truth behined NetPC as i am considering buying a PC in next 1 month.
Thanks and regards,
Rajesh
I want to buy your system net pc with bsnl broband
i want to buy bsnl net pc
sir,
i had heared about your dealership requirement for selling nova pc in trichy and pudukottai region am eagerly want to take the dealership of the nove net pc please respond me about the details .
may i get dealership of this nova navigator of bsnl?
Hello to All,
There are two important aspects to respond to here. One is the pricing and the other related to services.
First, let me clarify the pricing. We have very exciting plans with all the leading telecom service providers in the country, and over the last 4 years our endeavour has been to provide with the flexibility and choice to users. While the starting point was only the Delhi market with MTNL broadband, the prices were still a big draw. netPC deliberately leaves the monitor option with the customer, as we observed that a lot of customers wanted to use their existing monitors that they did not want to discard, OR wanted to use the money saved on PC to fuel the purchase of an LCD monitor (at times a big 17/19 inches) that really benefitted their overall purchase.
Regarding the monthly subscrition, netPC doesn’t charge anything monthly for the PC component. the services that are priced at 300 or 400 per month are a 100% managed desktop to the customer, with high speed internet access built in. In the start it was limited to one time based plan, however, all the current plans are those that any other PC user would buy from the Telecom company. The starting subscription (starting as low as 175 Rs) covers not only the mundane media player (which incidentally can be used to stream movie and music from local USB/phone/any storage device) but also covers a complete virus and spam coverage, 24×7 remote support, helpline, lifetime upgrades on desktop services, multiple user logins, open office productivity suite (word/excel/ppt equivalent), email, online storage (safe & secure) & accessible from anywhere in the world should you need it on your travel, choice of multiple operating systems all at the same screen etc. We should really compare this with the hassle, maintenance and obsolescence (getting old and useless) costs involved in a PC.
I have personally never really liked the blue screen of death in a PC environment or driver failures etc… I believe that this is really one product that cuts across segments of customers and not really is a cheap PC as it appears. The benefits are far and wide, and with all Telecom companies partnering with them inspite of the fact that the IBMs, HCLs of the world also have bundling schemes with BSNL, this one really is a worth a try service.
BTW, there is no harm in trying it as with BSNL what the offer is that you can return it if you are not satisfied, and BSNL shall refund the remaining subscription.
If not more, it has at least prompted us to think a little differently on desktops.. I am a user of Nova service, and i am very satisfied, as for the first time a desktop occupies my 32 inches TV screen in the living room with internet content playing, news feeds showing up, and anyone in our family responding to family emails.
cheers!
Hello All
I m using nova netpc for quite some time now ..& i feel its a revolutionary product …i m very much satisfied with the product & services …. do give it a try….
and for Dealership visit the link below..
http://www.novatium.com/partner-with-us.htm
regards
gaurav
hello sir,
please send me the details of price and other details regarding Nova pc for salem district.
Hi mam,
check the price
A. For New BSNL Broadband Connection:
– BSNL Nova netPC Product price : Rs. 2999.00 + 4% VAT
Keyboard +Mouse+ Modem
- Installation Charge: : Rs. 700.00 + 10.30% ST
- Monthly Service Charge : Rs. 175.00 + 10.30%
=====================================================================
B. For Non BSNL Customers & Existing BSNL Broadband connections.
– Nova Navigator Product price : Rs. 5699.00 + 4% VAT
Keyboard +Mouse
- Monthly Service Charge : Rs. 175.00 + 10.30%
=====================================================================
c. For Rural Bsnl Customers
- Bsnl Nova net pc +Keyboard +Mouse + Monitor : Rs. 2259.00
- Monthly Service Charge : Rs. 175.00 + 10.30%
In case you have any other specific questions? We would be glad to provide you with an answer.
Toll Free No – 1800 425 6682
hope you find the information useful
thanks
Please provide complete list of dealers/retailers with valid phone nos. so that we can contact them.
Thanks
Can you please tell me which part of India you stay so that i can provide the nearest dealer.
Hi.
this is bhaskar.
i am staying in bangalore. I am interested in buying the pc. Please provide me the contact details to get the pc. Please send the details to my email id: bhaskarbhuyan@gmail.com
Hi Bahaskar,
You can buy the product through the official channel partners of Novatium. Please find the channel partner near your location in this URL,
http://www.novatium.com/locate-dealers.htm
Hope it helped
pls.send me chennai-kk Nagar,vadapalani area Distributots address.