Bharti Airtel, which launched its 4G LTE broadband in Pune today, also introduced a new movie streaming service – Airtel Broadband TV, and a gaming service.
Under Airtel Broadband TV service, 4 G customers can watch 76 channels live and various on-demand videos on their laptop or desktop by paying Rs 150 per month. The service will be free of charge during the initial trial period.
The on-demand content include movies, music, entertainment and news, Airtel said.
The company had earlier launched its Airtel Movies service in Bengaluru. That has a movie library of 1,250 titles comprising recent chartbusters, classics, and “lot of critically acclaimed movies across different language and genres” (action, comedy, drama, romance, etc).
“While the monthly subscription pack is Rs.149, we now have a offer free trial offer for all our 4G customers,” it said.
It also introduced another potential money spinner – live hosted gaming. While normal gaming software costs several hundred rupees to install, under Airtel’s service, users can play games like FIFA and NFS by paying a monthly rental. Prices range from Rs. 5 a day for 30 games to Rs. 199 per month for over 350 games.
Among the game publishers whose products will be on offer are EA, Ubisoft, Square-Enix, PopCap and Alawar.
Initially, seven Games On-Demand plans are now available for customers in Pune.
It is believed that the company will extend these services to other cities soon, including possibly to customers of its fixed line broadband as well.
Airtel also said that it is planning to offer voice services on 4G LTE. We have plans to roll out “India’s first multi-mode LTE TDD smartphone in India alongwith partners Qualcomm and Huawei,” it said.
Before Pune, it had launched 4G LTE services in Bangalore and Kolkata.