|
Prabhat Kumar Sinha
Treasurer,
Bihar IT Association
How big is the Patna IT market?
We have around 100 active resellers selling about 2,000 PCs per month. The market has seen a growth of 60 percent in the last few years. However, the recent floods in the state has badly affected the market.
What are the drivers for IT growth?
The home segment contributes around 70 percent of the revenue. With the presence of institutes like IIT, NIT and NIFT, the education segment follows by contributing around 20 percent while the SMB segment contributes around 10 percent.
What are the IT buying trends?
Laptops are ruling the market, and account for 60 percent of the total demand. There has also been an increase in the demand for lifestyle products such as home theater systems, DVD players and MP3 players. We have also seen a growth in the demand for Wi-Fi solutions from the home and SMB segments. Laptops and computers that come with Wi-Fi enabled configurations are gaining popularity. These solutions are in demand not only from education institutes but also from home users and SMBs.
What are the key challenges facing resellers?
Service, ignorance about new schemes, and decreasing margins are the key issues. Post-warranty support is an ongoing problem because replacement parts are never available with the local ASPs. Getting spares usually takes 10 days. We do not receive enough information about the latest products or schemes. This often leads to a lot of complications. There is also not enough training provided by vendors.
What are the activities organized by your association?
The Bihar IT Association is ten years old and has around 80 members. We are looking to increase this number to 200 by the end of 2008. We regularly organize different activities including an IT Awareness Mela, seminars on various topics, a technology symposium, IT trade discussion forums, and an annual general meeting. Earlier this year we held the first-ever IT fair in the state. It was inaugurated by Dr Anil Kumar, the IT minister of Bihar. After seeing what a success it was, we decided to make it an annual event. |