Logica unveils SMS service for landlines
SMS company Logica has launched a text service that will enable text messages to be sent to fixed-line telephones and is aiming to attract advertisers to the new service.
Unveiled this week at an industry event in Singapore, the Fixed Line Short Message Service Centre is billed as the “first completely inter-operable SMS technology”. This means that any mobile phone should be able to send a text message to any fixed-line phone – and vice versa.
Logica claims it will be able to create an automated voice option for home phones that do not feature an LCD display. Text messages would automatically detect such phones and be read out by a computerised voice when the phone is answered.
Logica’s move, which would also create new revenue opportunities for fixed-line operators, builds on an initiative by Amstrad’s e-mailer phone, which has tried to forge close ties with advertisers including Domino’s Pizza.
A Logica spokesman stresses that all home-targeted SMS ads will work on a strictly opt-in basis and will be designed so as not to result in phones ringing in the middle of the night.
The company will not reveal any clients for the messaging service, but claims to be in talks with two interested parties.