Now, a tablet phone from Kerala for Rs 7,999

Three engineers in their mid-20s, from start-up company Telmoco Development Labs in Trivandrum’s consumer electronics incubator Technopark, who developed this Android phone want to make their product company as successful as Infosys is as a services company.

Attitude Next 6339 is a 7-inch Android tablet phone from Telmoco Development Labs Pvt. Ltd., the first Kerala-incubated consumer electronics start-up based in Technopark, Trivandrum. Their first product, 7-inch tablet Attitude Daksha, launched in May 2012, and priced at Rs 5,399 may not have received the kind of hype the Akash tablet did but it got a decent booking for 17,000 pieces when it was launched.

They have moved on from Daksha when they found that customers prefer calling facilities in a tablet, and that was how they launched Attitude Next 6339.

Those behind Telmoco who launched the tablet phone are three youngsters, all in their mid-twenties, led by C R Nijesh (Director, Engineering and Technology), Aadhith Bose (Director, Engineering Operations and Procurement) and Kalpa Radhakrishnan (Director, Accounts, Operations and HR).

From the age of 16, Nijesh had this desire to be an entrepreneur but there was strong resistance from the family; they preferred him taking up a 'safe job' than entering the world of uncertainties and tension as an entrepreneur.

Surprisingly, his inspiration was not any entrepreneur but Rahul Dravid, the cricketer. "I had read his biography and was enamoured of a middle class young man choosing a career in cricket and becoming a youth icon in India. I found his life very inspiring, and wanted to do something of my own."

At the age of 18, as an engineering student, he along with his friends started a company to help students in recruitment. Later, they approached the Business Incubation Centre at the Technopark for support. When the company moved on to software, Nijesh, a hardware man exited from the company to start Telmoco Development Labs Pvt Ltd along with his  friends Aadhith and Kalpa, as a consumer electronics company. 

That was the time the Government of India had come out with the Aakash tablet but it was not easily available to those who wanted it and those who got it, found many flaws in it. Aadhith wondered why they could not bring out a cheaper tablet that could compete with Aakash in the same segment.

In 2011, the company designed a board and made a prototype of a tablet but the final product was outsourced to manufacturing units in Taiwan.

When the 7-inch tablet Attitude Daksha was launched in May 2012, priced at Rs 5,399, in one day, they got bookings for 17,000 tablets. "With all the subsidies, Aakash was priced at Rs 3,399." Within three months, they delivered half the orders.

The icing on the cake: the BBC selected Daksha as one of the top 6 products from India.

That was when the company got the seed fund of Rs 50 lakh (Rs 5 million) from Department of Science and Technology, Government of India which gave them the idea to position Telmoco as a consumer electronics company.

Soon, they understood that to survive in the market, they needed to have a tablet that is almost like a smartphone with calling facility. So, they decided to come out with another tablet that has calling facilities, GPS and also Wi-Fi, and named it Attitude Next. 

Attitude Next 6339 is a name that was derived from internal project code 6339. It is the second generation device from Telmoco, after the successful first generation tab Daksha. Hence the name Next 6339."

Attitude Next 6339, a 7-inch Android tablet-phone priced at Rs 7,999  and is targeted at the mid segment and supports 2G, GPS, FM, Wi-Fi and Bluetooth.

It was launched in the market in February by P K Kunhalikutty, Kerala's Industries and IT Minister.

From the time it was launched, Telmoco has already sold 899 units and another 1,000 units are under production.

And the dream of the young team is, "We would like to be as successful as Infosys was as an Indian start-up in the IT industry. In another 20-30 years we would like to make India an electronic hub so that we can be one of the leading contenders in IT as well as electronic exports,” says Nijesh.