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Rajeev Chokani
CEO,
Chokani Computers
How big is the Ranchi IT market?
Being the capital of Jharkhand, the city has 65 active resellers selling around 700 PCs per month. Over the past one year, we have seen a growth of over 30 percent. The IT market has definitely been affected by the current slowdown. We have witnessed a decrease in demand for IT products across all segments.
What are the drivers for IT growth?
In Ranchi, the corporate segment contributes to about 50 percent of the demand. The remaining demand is generated by home users and the SMB and SOHO segments. Due to the large scale industrialization taking place in the region, there has been a huge influx of companies, thereby leading to a rise in demand for IT products.
What are the buying trends?
Corporates demand PCs and networking products like routers and servers. Home users generally demand for products like PCs, peripherals and lifestyle products like mp3 players, digital cameras and home theater systems. Assembled computers are also preferred by home users and educational segment. Assembled computers still contribute over 50 percent to the desktop sales. There has also been an increase in demand for notebooks.
What are the key challenges faced by resellers?
Migration of youth is a major problem that resellers face in the city. Most of the people prefer to shift to larger cities for better job opportunities. Hence we have to spend considerable time in searching and training appropriate personnel. LFRs are posing a major threat for small retailers, who are losing out on business.
Vendors don’t have their service outlets in the city. This results in a delay in post sales services. The turnaround time is several days as we have to send the faulty products to nearby cities for repair or replacement.
What are the activities organized by your association?
Currently, the city does not have any association of its own. However, the resellers are planning to start an association and will affiliate it to the Computer Association of Eastern India. |