IT World • Created November 11, 2013 04:00

Islamic SIM to be showcased in Africa

The Islamic SIM Service (ISS), designed by Greek electrical engineer Yiannis Hatzopoulis, enables users to track the direction of the Kaa’bah, receive accurate prayer timing, convert dates between Gregorian and Arabic calendars and automatically ban incoming calls during prayer time.The SIM will be showcased at Africa Com in Cape Town from 12 – 14 November.Hatzopoulis […]

Islamic SIM to be showcased in Africa
Islamic SIM to be showcased in Africa

The Islamic SIM Service (ISS), designed by Greek electrical engineer Yiannis Hatzopoulis, enables users to track the direction of the Kaa’bah, receive accurate prayer timing, convert dates between Gregorian and Arabic calendars and automatically ban incoming calls during prayer time.
The SIM will be showcased at Africa Com in Cape Town from 12 – 14 November.
Hatzopoulis says the Islamic SIM Service is currently under scrutiny by mobile operators in several countries, but that it would be premature to speculate on its distribution in Africa.
He says the ISS came about after he noted the success of LG’s Islamic phones in 2009, and saw a gap in the market for good Islamic services running on generic feature phones. He says: “I realised that I could pack most of the functions of an Islamic phone inside a SIM card, to turn any casual feature phone into an Islamic phone, simply through the swap of its SIM card.”
He says he elected to release the functionality in a GSM SIM rather than a smartphone app, because around a billion GSM feature phones are in use in Asia and Africa, due to their low prices, long battery lives and ease of use.
“Also, there are places where the networks have not been upgraded to 3G, which can support a functional smartphone with Islamic apps; and in most places prepaid connections and high churn rates exist.  The SIM is cheap, so this type of product offering could be used as a utility gadget by mobile networks, to attract those users that could not really afford an Islamic phone or smartphone, but would find it convenient to introduce Islamic features in their existing GSM phones,” says Hatzopoulis.

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