Every phone that manufacturers bring out today is aimed for the youth. All the features and widgets that come bundled with it are all targeted at the younger generation. It is a wise gesture from the manufacturers because the youth are the driving force in the market. It is they who painstakingly look at all the features of the phone and select a best option for themselves.

But things have changed now and manufacturers are beginning to respect the demands of the old age generation and introduce handsets specifically for them. The i-Ball Aasaan is one such example.

i-Ball has clearly defined a micro segmented strategy for bringing out mobile phones, specifically targeting needs of each segment. I-Ball Aasaan is targeted at old people"s needs.

1.The large keyboard with support for both English and Hindi will be of great help to older people who usually have problems using today"s handsets which usually come with small and congested keypads or even touch screen for the matter.
2.Some have eye problems and they would not be able to make out the separation between the keys if they are tightly spaced. Hence the key pad fonts also made bold.
3.Support for Hindi is an added advantage for native rural old age population.
4.A Save our soul, SOS button is provided at the back side. In case of some emergency, on clicking that button, a message will be sent to mobile numbers of five close friends or relatives.

This is what is called 'segmentation' and 'personalization'. But since the i-Ball Aasaan ,is not Youth oriented but for old age group, the features of the phone are kept at a bare minimum. In fact it is just a phone and does not serve as a multimedia entertainment gadget that mobile phones have turned out to be in these days. Other features include:

1.Entertainment is limited to the polyphonic ring tones, a FM Radio and headset.
2.It has a 1.65" mono colour display that suits elders well and has large display fonts.
3.It has 32 MB of internal memory which is of practically no use considering its functionality.

One key drawback of the i-Ball Aasaan , is that it has poor battery backup of just 200 minutes. Users have to frequently plug it in for charging, something which old people will find it difficult to do. And for its minimal features and functionality it comes at a somewhat awkward price of around Rs.3,250 which is very expensive.

So this, the i-Ball Aasaan , is the first phone aimed for old age people, which is rather an innovative idea but the company could have come up with a better phone with much more features or it could have reduced the price band to suit the buying power of retired old age population.

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