Hub-based mobile communication solutions provider Mach will launch a Data Roaming Engine (DRE) to tap increased data usage on mobiles while in roaming.

The new solution will allow the mobile operators to come up with data packages based on user needs. The company has carried out its pilot with a couple of operators, according to Morten Brøgger, CEO, Mach. “This can be even used for pre-paid accounts to open up new market avenues. The end users too will have control to lower their roaming phone bills without cutting down on the use of smartphones while traveling abroad,” he said.

Brøgger was here to visit Mach’s Hyderabad facility, which has its global data clearing platform.

MACH earns its revenues by settling roaming tariffs between operators. The company handles about two billion call data records, and the figure can be ramped up. “The era of using price as a bait is over,” Brøgger said, adding that 3G network, particularly on roaming, has an untapped business potential. Roaming traffic in India is growing at 20 per cent every month and the use of 3G will accelerate this significantly.

Globally, 44 per cent people switch their data usage off in roaming for fear of a ‘bill shock’. As a result even the most premium smartphones are not used to the optimum while roaming. In price-sensitive markets such as India, more than 90 per cent of the smartphone users switch off the services. Incidentally, about 76 per cent of those traveling have never experienced the benefits of ‘roaming’ facilities offered by mobile operators.

And those roaming use data sparingly. “Same people when at home tend to use more than 300 times the data they use while roaming,” said Ragunatha Chary, regional VP (sales), India, “One size fits all king packages should make way for a specific packages like emails, Google and the like,” he said, adding that a flat rate based on the operating systems should be evolved as data usage pattern varies with operating systems.