The latest in the series of internet-related technological adaptations which are opening up doors for new services, e-paging is a hybrid of conventional e-mail and paging which is set to take the country by storm.

If you thought that messaging is all there is to it, hold your breath. Thanks to e-paging very soon you may even be able to switch on your electronic oven from a moving car for a hot dinner or switch on any other gadget even before you reach the location.

Still a relatively new concept even in the West, e-paging has already made a silent entry into the country through paging services company PagePoint Services, a Motorola joint venture which runs the Hot Line Paging.

"While messaging is the only service on offer right now, we arecertainly thinking futuristic," says Arjun Chakraborti of PagePoint. Motorola has these technologies which can be introduced once the market has been sufficiently prepared, he says. And e-paging is the first step in that direction.

"E-page proves that a person really does not need a computer to use e-mail and it frees the user from the confines of an office reaching the message irrespective of where he or she is," he says.

However, he is quick to clarify that e-paging is not to be confused with internet paging which is based on using certain websites for sending pager as well as voice messages. Though PagePoint too has its own internet paging site, e-paging is different in the sense that it is open to people who do not have access to an internet node.

Though relatively new, the concept is catching on particularly in Hyderabad where people are quite IT savvy and acceptance has been more widespread though the service, which is best suited for business and corporates, has been introduced on a verylow-key. "While paging itself is territory bound, e-paging has expanded the physical limits and we have instances where people keep in touch even with their offices in Singapore and other countries," Chakraborti says.

The company offers both in-bound and out-bound e-paging along with its basic paging services or as a stand alone as some corporates have demanded.