Intex Technologies (India) Ltd has launched Intex Hero -- a mobile phone with 45 days stand-by battery life and five LED lights, making it a handy gizmo for towns with long-power cuts.

In rural India where people suffer prolonged power cuts, Intex Hero may bring some respite with its strong battery backup.

Speaking at the launch, Sanjay Kumar, DGM, telecom, Intex Technologies, said, “Out of the total subscriber base for mobile phones, more than a quarter comes from rural India. The acceptance rates of mobile phones is growing at a fast pace amongst rural and semi-urban consumers. Intex Hero promises to address their basic needs of convenience and communication and signifies a focussed brand line expansion to offer more value to our customers. Intex Mobile phone portfolio now has 15 feature-rich entry and mid-level variants. The models are making their presence felt in more than 300 B and C towns across Northern, Eastern and Western India with a wide spread sales counter network, supported by more than 100 service franchisees."

The Hero has 1800mAh rating battery that should provide more than adequate battery back up. The company is actually claiming that it will be able to offer users, on a full charge, a talk time of up to 9 hours. This would make it particularly apt for the consumers in tier II & III regions. Other features include an FM radio, camera, expandable memory, MP3 audio player, a 1000 contacts phonebook memory etc.

The handset is priced at Rs. 2,999 (MOP) which seems a like a great deal if it comes through with the battery life.