These wireless phones can be used in 30 km radius. The subscribers can use these while moving around in tractors or bullock carts and for making STD, ISD calls, sending faxes and E-Mails (at 9.5 kbps) at DoT rates or lower.

In fact, the service provider can work out a revenue sharing arrangement with DoT, charge as low as 50 paise for local calls and still stand to make a profit, according to President Telecom CEO Vijay Singh.

Comtech Wireless has designed and patented the system in the US.

Comtech will be selling through President Telecom the IWiLL - 2000 an integrated wireless local loop access system, a telephone company in a single cabinet. The system does away with the need for cables for 30 kms, `the last mile link' to the PSTN (Public Switched Telephone Network) and makes it more cost-effective.

The I WiLL - 2000 has digital and analog trunk interfaces to the PSTN which could be 30 kms away, provides cellular mobility, direct inward dialling, tone and pulse dialling, bill record archiving, priority call set-up and multi-site calling. It has a built-in digital switch and within a cell offers subscriber to subscriber connectivity and two-way access to the global telephone network, all at a cost of Rs 1.5 crore.

The system which can be installed in two days has 16 channels and can handle 1,000 rural subscribers. But it is not designed for high density and cannot be used in metros.

For the service provider who will have to invest Rs 1.5 crore and a little more for an air-conditioned room and hand sets (universal platform of AMPS with future compatibility with IS-136, GSM, CDMA), he could charge a regular connection fee of Rs 3000 and another Rs 2000 for the hand set and recover 50 per cent of his investments. The remaining would come through revenues during the course of the first two years, Singh said. There is also a built-in debit system for offering prepaid services.

President Telecom hopes to sell more than 400 systems in the first year within India and the neighbouring countries. Comtech Wireless has also initiated R&D efforts to bring about similar WLL systems that can handle higher volumes of traffic. It plans to take the system to small towns by January 2000 and to metro cities by 2001.