The price of buying a CDMA phone was that you would be tied in to a particular handset and service for the foreseeable future, and would miss out on a lot of new technologies. Samsung is looking to change that with the launch of the world’s first OMH phone, Mpower 699, in the Indian market in cooperation with Qualcomm.
The revolutionary OMH technology, available on the CDMA platform, gives mobile customers the flexibility to buy a CDMA handset and SIM cards from various CDMA operators of their choice, since the network settings for the connection shift from the phone to the OMH SIM card.
All Indian CDMA operators are providing an OMH SIM card with the distinct OMH mark along with the new handset.
Announcing the launch of Samsung Mpower 699 in the Indian market, Mr. Jung Soo Shin, President & CEO, Samsung South West Asia HQ stated: “This OMH launch represents a paradigm shift in the dynamics of the CDMA ecosystem with consumers now having the flexibility to choose an operator at their will at any point in time. OMH empowers a CDMA customer as never before and will serve to fuel the growth in the CDMA handset market. We at Samsung are proud to be leading this innovation with Qualcomm and appreciate the support given by CDMA operators towards popularizing OMH.”
“OMH handsets, such as Samsung’s feature rich Mpower 699, play a central role in offering Indian subscribers the freedom, flexibility and choice to easily change or upgrade their handsets. With currently more than 100 million CDMA subscribers, we expect OMH to play a key role in driving the growth of CDMA in India,” said Kanwalinder Singh, Senior Vice President of Qualcomm Inc and president of Qualcomm India and South Asia.
The switch over process to new OMH SIM cards from existing R-UIM/SIM connections is very easy, the company says, adding that the phone also supports the existing R-UIM/SIM for voice and SMS as well as data services. In addition, the OMH SIM too is backward compatible to support all previously launched CDMA handsets which support R-UIMs/SIMs.
As for the phone itself, here are the specifications:
Screen: 2.2 inches, 256K colours, 176×220 pixels resolution
Camera: 1.3-megapixel, video recording; no autofocus/LED flash
Storage: 20MB internal memory; microSD card of 1GB (expandable up to 2GB)
Multimedia: FM radio with RDS, speaker phone, MPEG-4/MP3/AAC player
Connectivity: Bluetooth, microUSB (with USB charging)
Battery: 4 hours talk-time; 12 days stand-by time
Packaged with stereo earphones, a travel adaptor and a data cable, the Mpower 699 is priced at Rs 7,100.