Nokia's Bicycle Charger

Rs. 1,499 charger provides 28 minute talk time for 10 minutes of cycling

Nokia's bicycle charger about which we had reported last year will finally hit India sometime in March this year. The Indian price is set at Rs. 1,499. The nifty little charger works on the tried and tested dynamo based mechanism that has been the de-facto standard for bicycle lights. The bicycle charger is a regular charger attached to a dynamo that draws power from the rotating sidewall of the front wheel.

It gives 28 minutes of talk time for 10 minutes of cycling at speeds between 6 kmph and 50 kmph. The 2mm charger interface is packaged with a Nokia charger, a phone holder and a bottle dynamo. Jatin Kaushik, a sales representative at Nokia, says, "The device is targeted at markets like India, and is bound to do excellently well. The company plans to bring Bicycle accessories including the dynamo charger, by the end of Feb, latest by March this year".

We can't be so sure about the doing well, because of the price that's a good chunk of what an average bicycle costs here. Moreover, the urban Indian population which looks like the target audience for this device might find it to be overpriced. So charging a phone, which is something one does every other day, sounds unviable on a product that won't be used as frequently. We think this most probably will end up as a novelty device with not many takers.