CRN Network
Buoyed by its success in the netbook category and marketshare gains in consumer PCs, Acer India is planning an aggressive retail push in 2009.
The company intends to expand its consumer PC portfolio by bringing into India globally successful brands such as Gateway and eMachines. It also plans to grow its retail network in 2009 and boost its share in the netbook category.
“Worldwide, we are less than a basis point away from taking the leadership position from HP in the mobile computing space. Our growth rate in 2009 would be far in excess of that of the overall industry, particularly in India where we will launch our new brands in Q2,” said S Rajendran, CMO, Acer India.
In 2008, Acer India recorded a marketshare of 15 percent and 6 percent in the consumer notebook and desktop segments respectively. Its share in the emerging category of netbooks was even more impressive at 40 percent.
The company plans to increase its retail network. “We have 275 stores across 150 cities. Over 100 are exclusive stores in 60 cities. We will expand this to 350 stores by year-end with 150 exclusive stores. The major focus for retail expansion is upcountry as we look to consolidate our retail operations via modern retail stores in major metros,” informed Rajendran.
Acer expects smaller cities to emerge as key battlegrounds that will grow faster than the overall market. “Despite the economic uncertainty, we expect notebooks to grow at 30 percent in 2009 and netbooks to grow by over 100 percent. Nearly 35 percent of our consumer business will come from upcountry markets,” said Rajendran.
Quoting IDC figures, he stated that the netbook segment worldwide is expected to grow from 10 million units in 2008 to 25 million in 2009. With a first-mover advantage in this emerging category, Acer sees it as the key engine to gain leadership in PCs. The company plans to launch different variants of netbooks and will soon have special zones within exclusive stores and multi-brand stores to showcase its netbooks.
Also on the cards is the launch of netbook’s desktop cousin, the nettop. Acer believes that the nettop has tremendous potential in India where PC penetration is less than 5 percent.
Elaborating about the companies strategies to help partners to cope with the slowdown Rajendran said, “We have already taken steps such as reducing targets by over 30 percent while maintaining the rebate payouts. We are organizing several meets to share global retail best practices with our retail partners. To create demand, we plan to go heavy on outdoor marketing in upcountry locations in Q2.”
Regarding the increased competition faced by IT retailers from LFRs Rajendran opined, “We do not look at the situation in terms of ‘LFRs vs IT retailers.’ Instead, we believe that both these constitute important segments within the retail fold.” |