Date: 06/08/2010

IBM and IIT Bombay to research on new mobile phone interfaces

The IT tech joint IBM has announced an Open Collaboration Research (OCR) project with the Industrial Design Centre (IDC) at the Indian Institute of Technology, Bombay (IIT Bombay). The collaboration is aimed at developing mobile phone interfaces for the people who can't read and write, otherwise have difficulty in using present day phones and computers.

This is nice idea and is also better for the members involved in this project to get networked with the $35 tablet computer development team in India as well as OLPC team in US to work closely. The fact is, by using today's IT gadgets with audio-visual interfaces, people need not know how to read and write to access multimedia knowledge files, that's where a new big-big market is emerging. This technology can enable illiterates to get educated without learning text.

The mobile phone platform is more suitable for this purpose than the computer due to its popularity in masses.

Here is a nice quote:
"Over the last few years, it has become clear that the next generation innovations in the ICTs will be directed towards solving the problems of developing countries like India. Many of our design students and researchers enjoy working on such problems. The collaboration between IIT Bombay and IBM gives us the opportunity to explore and apply some of the newest technologies for this purpose. It is not only mutually beneficial but also intends to address larger socio-economic challenges." said Prof. Anirudha Joshi, Associate Professor, IIT Bombay.