Islamic SIM to be showcased in Africa. BizTechAfrica Report

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The voice of Africa's ICT sector
Islamic SIM to be showcased in Africa
10th December 2013 17:13
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By BiztechAfrica - Nov. 5, 2013, 5:29 p.m.
Image: By BiztechAfrica
A new SIM-based application designed to offer a range of
functions to users of even lower end feature phones will be
showcased at Africa Com in Cape Town next week.
The Islamic SIM Service (ISS), designed by Greek electrical
engineer Yiannis Hatzopoulis, enables users to track the
direction of the Kaa’bah, receive accurate prayer timing,
convert dates between Gregorian and Arabic calendars and
automatically ban incoming calls during prayer time.
The SIM will be showcased at Africa Com in Cape Town from 12
– 14 November.
Hatzopoulis says the Islamic SIM Service is currently under
scrutiny by mobile operators in several countries, but that it
would be premature to speculate on its distribution in Africa.
He says the ISS came about after he noted the success of LG’s Islamic phones in 2009, and saw a gap in the market
for good Islamic services running on generic feature phones. He says: “I realised that I could pack most of the
functions of an Islamic phone inside a SIM card, to turn any casual feature phone into an Islamic phone, simply
through the swap of its SIM card.”
He says he elected to release the functionality in a GSM SIM rather than a smartphone app, because around a billion
GSM feature phones are in use in Asia and Africa, due to their low prices, long battery lives and ease of use.
“Also, there are places where the networks have not been upgraded to 3G, which can support a functional
smartphone with Islamic apps; and in most places prepaid connections and high churn rates exist. The SIM is cheap,
so this type of product offering could be used as a utility gadget by mobile networks, to attract those users that could
not really afford an Islamic phone or smartphone, but would find it convenient to introduce Islamic features in their
existing GSM phones,” says Hatzopoulis.
The concept prototype was submitted to SIMagine, a development and business plan contest event run by
SIMAlliance (www.simalliance.org) in 2010. The project won a Best Mobile App award that year, which subsequently
led to contacts with SIM manufacturers, who eventually provided resources to build the first network connected
samples for market evaluation.
Hatzopoulis is now working with leading manufacturer Bluefish Technologies on the project.
“This SIM basically offers on plain-vanilla feature phones what you get on an Islamic phone/smartphone, minus the
Quoran text. We get a dial-a-Quoran voice recital instead with the SIM.”
The service is location independent and enables the user to find the direction even when roaming, with the new
prayer times and direction automatically calculated and sent to the subscriber vie SMS or MMS.
He notes that not only can operators generate customer loyalty through the service, they can also offer it as a
subscription service or increase ARPU due to the increased SMS usage.
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