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Bhopal, Madhya Pradesh
Bhopal, the capital of Madhya Pradesh is known as the ‘City of Lakes’, as its landscape is dotted with a number of natural as well as manmade lakes. Of late, the city is buzzing with activity on the IT front as the state government has given a green signal to setting up of a software and hardware technology park. Companies like Genpact, Fujitsu and Taurus Microsystems have already announced plans to open their R&D centers in the upcoming SEZ.
Channel Scenario
Bhopal’s channel community comprises of nearly 180 active resellers who sell about 900 PCs a month. It also has two channel associations—the Bhoj Information Technology Association and the Office Automation Association.
Opportunities
Bhopal has a developing IT market and the demand for products is dominated by home users, educational institutions and small and medium enterprises.
“We have seen the demand for IT and office automation products grow at a substantial 30 percent last year, mostly on the back of increasing SMB and home demand and also from the several e-governance projects initiated by the state government,” says Anupam Chansoria, Secretary of Bhoj Information Technology and Office Automation Association and CEO, Creative Computers.
Manvendra Singh, Managing Director of Latest Devices anticipates huge demand coming from the state cooperative banks. “Most of these banks have got the dictum from RBI to computerize. This is likely to generate a demand of at least 10,000 desktops in the near future, plus the opportunity for providing networking, connectivity, software solutions and software,” he contends.
Chorasia is also counting on the education segment to boost IT growth in the city. “There are as many as 37 engineering colleges in Bhopal district. Many of these colleges have made it mandatory for students to have notebooks on the campus. This will also spur demand for wireless and storage,” says Chansoria.
SMBs are another set of customers that are increasingly going wireless. “We have several small businesses who are demanding wireless connectivity to connect different branches or even different floors in the same office. This include retailers and training classes,” adds Chorasia.
All this has led to a massive demand for notebooks. “The share of laptops has increased to around 400 units while that of desktops has reduced from 600 to 500 units last year suggesting a paradigm shift in customer PC buying behavior,” opines Singh.
Challenges
Just like any other tier-2 city, Bhopal too faces the same challenges of reducing margins and price undercutting. Retail chains too have had an impact on smaller resellers catering to home and SOHO. “Maintaining margins is becoming difficult due to increasing cost of manpower, higher interest rates amidst growing competition. In the past one year we have seen many small dealers shut shop due to such pressures. Only large sub-distributors with large volumes or those resellers that have moved up the value chain to provide networking solutions have survived,” Chansoria says.
Partner profile
Manvendra Singh,
Managing Director,
Latest Devices
System builder to retailer
Manvendra Singh, Managing Director of Latest Devices, started his business just after completing his BE in Computer Science and MCA from the Rajiv Gandhi Technical University in Bhopal.
Company Snapshot | | Company | Latest Devices | | CEO | Manvendra Singh | | Year of Inception | 1997 | | Brands | Lenovo, HP, Dell, IBM | Primary Business | Retailer | | Employees | 38 | Turnover | Rs. 20 Crore |
Singh started his business in partnership with his elder brother. They began as system builders but later moved to retail and corporate reselling.
Latest Devices claims to have done a turnover of Rs 20 crore last year and expects to more than double that this year to Rs 45 crore. “Nearly 60 percent of our revenues last year came from corporate reselling and remaining from retail. We have several large clients like Dainik Bhaskar, Rediff in Mumbai, Lupin and Ranbaxy. We have two retail stores—an exclusive Lenovo and Sony—each having a spread of 800 sq ft at prime locations in the city,” claims Singh.
The company plans to open a large multi-brand digital lifestyle mall in Bhopal and two more IT retail stores in Gwalior and Jabalpur and expects retail to contribute 50 percent of the revenues this year.
Presently, the company has 38 employees and also provides facility management services to corporates. “Nearly half of our employee base consists of technical people that operate as resident engineers for our corporate clients. Providing facility management services ensures a strong tie-in with customers and has guaranteed higher margins,” he says.
Singh is actively engaged with an orphanage named Matru Chaya and spends spend a lot of time with orphans. He also loves travelling besides playing squash and guitar. |