Indian operator Spice Telecom has announced a sub-$20 handset intended for first-time buyers in the country’s vast potential market.  The so-called “People’s Phone” will be pitched at under 1,000 Indian Rupees, and be a very basic model lacking SMS messaging or even a screen.  “It is just a phone” Spice chairman Bhupendra Kumar Modi, explained, going on to express his intention to sell 10 million of the handsets in the next year.

Images of the People’s Phone are seemingly in short supply, but already Spice are working on an even cheaper model which would hit the sub-500 Indian Rupees price point (less than $10).  The market is certainly ripe for the taking: it is estimated that out of the country’s 1.1bn population, in excess of 870 million do not currently own a cellphone.  Analysts expect mobile users to hit 500 million over the next three years, in part due to manufacturers turning their attentions away from high-end smartphones and instead concentrating on designing low-cost handsets.

[via The Times]