My boyfriend is not picking up his phone. What should I do? Can I wear a light-blue shirt and cream pants to my job interview tomorrow? What is the chemical formula of sulphuric acid? At Innoz,a mobile search engine start-up based in Bangalore,the questions stream in fast and furious,at a rate of 3,000 queries per second. In an SMS-crazy country,millions of Indians who have not yet clambered aboard the internet revolution are using the texting feature on their mobile phones to search for instant answers. The queries pour through in Hinglish (a mix of Hindi & English),Kanglish (Kannada & English),Tanglish (Tamil & English) and a host of regional variations. Those seeking replies are mainly 18- to 25-year-olds middle-class Indians from small towns and smaller cities who do not have internet access. And their questions present a fascinating glimpse into the mind of the young,middle India. Teamed up with leading mobile service providers,the company currently fields 35 million queries each month for Re 1 an answer making it arguably the largest offline search engine in the world. Every time a user texts her query to 55444,Innozs software searches through own files and vast internet databases to pull out appropriate answers. Responses are sent back within seconds. An unlimited questions subscription costs all of Rs 30 and mobile service providers share with it their revenues. From Satara in the west and Imphal in the east to Rajahmundry in the south,love and romance,education and career,Bollywood and cricket are what fascinate Indias small-town youth the most. Others want to know how to get rid of dandruff,to become rich,to forget someone,or to gain height. An SMS is simple and extremely private, explains Deepak Ravindran,25,co-founder and CEO of Innoz,which calls itself the answer engine. Whatever the subject,people are not afraid to ask because the answer stays between you and your phone,he says. That explains why Innozs peak traffic is between 6 and 11 pm,when answers can be sought on menstruation to morning-after pill. The four founders of Innoz are small-town Indians themselves,who grew up and studied engineering in the coastal Kasargod town of Kerala. One day they saw a girl pass by them in the college corridor and turned to ask each other,How do we impress her? None of them had internet access on their phones to do a web search. It was then that they were struck by the idea of launching a cool SMS service that has all the answers,says Abhinav Sree,25,another founder. They dropped out of engineering college and launched Innoz in March 2011. Recently,the company received funding from venture firm Seedfund Advisors. In a country of 919 million mobile users,of which over half a billion dont have internet access,the potential for services that bridge the gap between the two is vast. To the often-asked question that once stumped its own founders,Innoz now has a standard reply. To impress a girl,the answer engine says: Be well groomed at all times.use deodorant daily.apply acne medicine if you have a skin problem.do not wear saggy pants. But ever so often,the know-it-all service can be left befuddled. Like when asked: What is the address of - (a girl)?
