On the occasion of the tenth anniversary of IBM’s India Research Labs, Big Blue has revealed a new initiative, which will help add more value-added features and functions to mobile devices with the objective to make them more useful for everyday tasks than PCs.

The new task, which will be led out of India, but is taking shape among IBM’s eight global labs in six countries across the world.

The projects that will come under this program includes the Spoken Web - Voice-enabled mobile commerce; Instant Translation - Real-time communication between multiple languages through mobile devices; SoulPad - Enabling any portable device to carry computing applications; Social networking on-the-go; and Good Samaritan - Mobile healthcare information.

An innovative plan, which is currently being piloted by the India Research group is the ‘Spoken Web’ that aims to let people make e-commerce sites using the spoken words, simulating the web on a telco network purposes where people can host and browse "VoiceSites," navigate through "VoiceLinks," and even carry out business transactions, all just by discussing over the telephone network.

The other pilot recently undertaken by IBM in South India is intended for the rustic population in which users can obtain information available on the Internet just by dialing a toll-free number.

This project involves providing information, which is linked to the basic needs of the people living in rural areas.