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They were perhaps the first signs and biggest beneficiaries of the Internet boom. But nearly a decade later, the friendly neighbourhood cyber cafés, that so many of the "gen next" survived on during their school and college years, are on their way out.
Localities that once saw cyber cafés compete with one another - on pricing, free computer training crash courses, cheaper printouts – now have barely one cyber café in business.
Over the years
For example, a 5-km radius in north Kolkata – within which reside Calcutta University, the elite Presidency College and at least six other of the city's premiere colleges - has not more than three cyber cafés. In contrast, there were at least nine cyber cafés in this area between 2000 and 2006.
Amitava Basu who runs one of the surviving cyber cafés in this locality of Kolkata started late in 2004. Back then, seeing the huge opportunity in offering Internet services to a data-starved consumer base, he converted his photo-copier (xerox) shop into a cyber café with around six machines. "Today it’s mostly games that my subscribers want. Occasionally some surf the Internet or fill up online forms. Sometimes it's printouts that they come to get in my shop," he says adding that business has come down substantially.
A branded store that was once ubiquitous in the area is hardly present anymore. A handful of smaller cyber cafés still survive but perhaps the cost of running the business is more than what they earn. "Junction" was one such home-grown cyber café brand that had adopted the cyber café franchise route to set up shops in different parts of the city. The entire chain, it seems, has now vanished.
The situation is no different in other parts of the country. There were at least 5 cyber cafés in Ber Sarai of New Delhi, but now there only two. “We generate more money from printouts than people coming to surf the net," say the cyber café owners at Ber Sarai.
In Mumbai too most of the café owners are facing a bleak future. “Our cyber café is mostly empty now. There was a time when we had about 70 to 80 users a day. This number has halved now and so has the revenue,” says Sudhir S, who manages Amrut Xerox and Stationers at Churchgate.
The decline
The biggest reason for the decline in cyber café business is the availability of cheaper Internet access on mobile phones. Mobile operators now offer unlimited browsing for 3 days at just Rs 14. In comparison, cyber cafés charge between Rs 10 and Rs 40 for one hour of browsing. The launch of third generation services by mobile firms has further increased uptake of wireless Internet services on phones.
Data from Nokia Siemens Networks, collected in its MBit Index, has revealed a 54 per cent increase in mobile data traffic in India between December 2011 and June 2012. The report further reveals that data traffic generated by 3G services has increased by 78 per cent while that of 2G services has increased by 47 per cent during the same period. The cyber café business has been caught at the wrong end of this growth.
“There is no business from cyber cafés now. There was at least one cyber café earlier (five years back) every 50 feet. But now, all those spaces are filled with some other shops.
It is more for print outs and gaming that I am running this cyber café," said a cyber café owner in Munirka of New Delhi.
Apart from cheaper tariffs, the mobile has also made Internet access easier, bringing it literally to the user’s fingertips. .
“I used to wait in the queue outside the cyber café about a year ago. It was really irritating because then I would get late for college. Now I carry my own tablet to surf the internet,” says Rashmi Gupta, a second year management studies student.
As a result of falling popularity, cyber café owners are forced to completely move to a new business.
Sanjay Jaiswal had closed down his cyber café in Kolkata three years ago and moved into the scrap iron business. "Thanks to the mobile boom and Internet on handset, dongles and 3G, cyber cafés are the most risky business now," says Jaiswal. Initially, students and then aspiring day traders flocked his store. But once the students got their cheaper broadband enabled devices and the stock markets crashed, his business too tanked. "Business was bad as most of my clients bought their own PCs and laptops," he added.
Another of the closed cyber cafés in Kolkata has changed hands and has been bifurcated into two shops. One is a stationery store, while the other is a sweet shop.
Even a big brand like Sify Technologies Ltd. (formerly Satyam Infoway), is moving into other areas.
Sify had caught the imagination of the public in the late 90's by breaking into the unexplored Internet field through its chain of iWay cyber cafés and had positioned itself as an integrated ICT company. In 2006, the number of cybercafés was over 3,000. This has come down to 1,900.
ronendrasingh.s@thehindu.co.in
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