Aircel offers free Nimbuzz plan for Jammu and Kashmir prepaid users

Even as Facebook partnered with the local telecom operators Airtel and Reliance Communications to promote Facebook Messenger, rival free instant messaging firm Nimbuzz has tied up with Aircel to launch special Nimbuzz plans.

To begin with, Aircel users in Jammu and Kashmir are offered free Nimbuzz messaging (up to 40MB of data ) for a period of 30 days. To use this service a user has to download the Nimbuzz app from a URL sent by Aircel. The offer is only available for Aircel prepaid users.

"Jammu and Kashmir is highly regulated market, where SMS services are unavailable; so our focus is on data. In the last 15 days, after the launch of Nimbuzz, data usage from our users in J&K went up by 25%." He said over 5,000 users have downloaded Nimbuzz in just 15 days, says Sandeep Talwar, Aircel's operator head for J&K.

Speaking on the partnership with Aircel, CEO of Nimbuzz Vikas Saxena says: "We are thankful to Aircel for making an effort towards taking mobile communication to masses with its newly launched Airtel-Nimbuzz data plan. We look forward to their continued support and we are confident that such initiatives will boost internet penetration in the country and bring an aggressive revenue stream for the mobile operators".

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Mahindra XUV500 launched in Nepal at 33 lakh rupees

The official distributor of Mahindra products in Nepal, Agni Incorporated, has introduced the Mahindra XUV500, and celebrated the memorable occasion by inaugurating a new dealer showroom and workshop.

Mahindra launched the XUV500 in South Africa the day following its local launch in late 2011. Soon after the price announcement for the Indian market, Mahindra officials said overseas markets were being eyed starting with the neighbouring countries. However the excess demand for the vehicle in the domestic market left Mahindra with no choice but to put off export plans.

For the Nepali market, the XUV500 W6 2WD, W8 2WD and W8 AWD  trim levels. The distributors believe that the XUV500 will create a new category in the premium SUV segment.

As the car is imported from India, there's no difference to the specifications. It is powered by a 2.2 litre mHawk Diesel engine which makes 140bhp of peak power and 330Nm of peak torque, paired to a 6-speed manual transmission. The ARAI fuel economy rating is 15.1 kpl.

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British teen sells mobile news app to Yahoo for GBP 18 million

A 17-year-old London school boy has made big news, after he sold his news app company to Yahoo, for an estimated 18 million. Nick D'Aloisio hails from Wimbledon in South London, had created the app called Summly - which provides crisp summaries of news content from various sites. The total transaction value is understood to be 18 million pounds, assumed to be 90 percent in cash and 10 percent in shares at Yahoo. However, some reports suggested that the total could go up to as much as 40 million pounds.

D'Aloisio, who learnt how to write code for apps when he was 12 years old, developed the app at the age of 15. The app was made for the iPhone, and till the time it was pulled from the Apple app store after the announcement of the Yahoo deal, has cloaked 1 million downloads. The application had content deals with 250 news sources globally, including the Rupert Murdoch owned News Corp.  and was managed by a team of 10 employees based in London. Over a period of time, D'Aloisio got monetary backing from Horizons Ventures, the venture capital arm of Hongkong billionaire Li Ka-Shing as well as Zynga Inc.'s Mark Pincus and actor Ashton Kutcher.

"We will be removing Summly from the App Store today but expect our summarisation technology will soon return to multiple Yahoo products - see this as a 'power nap' so to speak". Nick says in a post on his website.

This could be a big acquisition for Yahoo, as it aims to refresh and rebuild its offerings, after having lost relevance significantly, at least in the smartphone ecosystem.

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Maruti sells over one lakh Altos 800s in less than five months

Maruti Suzuki has managed to sell over one lakh units of the Alto 800 in less than five months. The A-segment car was launched as a successor to the base model Alto on October 16, 2012 and since then has been selling in great numbers.

The Alto 800 will be sold in many smaller markets like Nepal, Sri Lanka, Egypt and Algeria where the demand for small inexpensive cars is quite high.The Alto 800 competes with the Tata Nano and Hyundai Eon which is priced slightly higher but is sold with a few more features and a more modern design.

If the Maruti 800 and the regular Alto's sales are anything to go by, then we know that the Alto 800 will breach the two lakh mark by the time it has been on sale for a year.

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Royal Enfield to launch 250 cc motorbike to take on Bajaj and Honda

Royal Enfield, maker of the iconic Bullet Motorcycle, is learned to be contemplating a 250-cc motorbike for the Indian market.

The bike, which sources say is  in the early stages of development, may go on sale some time next year.

This would be a step-down of sorts for the Eicher Motors group company, whose products Bullet, Classic and Thunderbird are all in the 350-cc plus displacement range. The new bike would compete against Bajaj Auto's Pulsar 220cc and Honda's CBR 250R.

The company refused the confirm the development. "Royal Enfield is a dominant player in the premium 350 cc and above motorcycle segment in India and will continue with its focus on this segment. Currently, Royal Enfield is not planning any motorcycle below 350cc. In the second half of 2013, Royal Enfield will be launching the much awaited Cafe RAcer that will also be in the premium category," a spokesperson said.

Sources said Royal Enfield has secured a patent for twin spark engines between the 250 cc and 1,250 cc engine capacities, which would indicate that the company has significant long term plans for new products.

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Micromax Canvas A116 HD price increased to Rs. 14,900

Micromax Canvas 2 A110 took the world by storm due to its chunk of its hardware and an impressive price tag. The company behind the widely popular handset recently unveiled the successor to the Canvas 2 - the A116 Canvas HD smartphone.

The Canvas HD was unveiled with much fanfare in February and was expected to be available in the market soon. But before it could hit the shelves it went out of stock.

According to sources, the smartphone has been delayed due certain procedural issues.

To add insult to injury, the price of the upcoming phone has been increased from Rs. 13,999 to Rs. 14,999. Retail partner Snapdeal.com has stated in its statement that the increase in cost is the result of the changes in custom duty.

The company, however, indicated that before the end of March 2013 customers who have pre-booked the handset will get it for the original price which was Rs. 13,999.

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Sony unveils Xperia SP, L smartphones

Sony today unveiled its two new smartphones running on Android 4.2 (Jelly Bean) operating system. Both the smartphones are from Xperia platform - Xperia SP and Xperia L.

These phones are available in Red, White and Black colors and will hit the retail market by the second quarter of this year.

The all new Xperia SP has a 4.6-inch TFT screen with Bravia Engine 2 Technology and supports 7.2p videos. This smartphone packs a 1.7 GHz dual-core processor and has 8GB internal storage with microSD card support up to 32GB. This smartphone has an 8 megapixel camera and LED flash on the back with a VGA snapper in the front. Connectivity features of this smartphone include 2G, 3G, 4G, NFC, Bluetooth 4.0, Wi-Fi and micro USB. This device has a 2,370 mAh battery and has a casing made of plastic and co-moulded aluminium.

Whereas Sony Xperia L features 4.3-inch TFT display with a scratch resistant cover and is powered by a 1GHz dual-core processor. This device also comes with 8GB onboard and 32GB via microSD. On the back is an 8MP camera with flash, along with a front facing VGA shooter that can be used for video calls. This phone's connectivity suite consists of 2G, 3G, Wi-Fi, NFC, Bluetooth 4.0, micro USB 2.0.

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