Socomec UPS India, which recently began its operations in India in the
three-phase UPS market, is planning to enter into the single-phase UPS market
shortly. Parting from its joint venture with Numeric Power Systems that was
selling three-phase UPS in India, on mutual consent, Socomec UPS India was
launched in August 2008.
"We started with a joint venture with Numeric Power Systems successfully and
tripled our numbers within the first year of operations. Both parties decided on
the de-merger as both had different projections and wanted to focus more on
their key business," informed Norbert Jacobsen, MD, Socomec UPS India.
The vendor has partnered with Redington to ensure its products penetrate
tier-1, 2 and 3 cities. The tie-up of Socomec UPS India with Redington India,
comes close on the heels of Socomec setting up its subsidiary in the country to
get a grip of its marketing, distribution and retailing processes.
Socomec will be launching UPS starting from 400VA in the single-phase
segment. "We are no longer focusing on the three-phase UPS alone and will come
out with stronger range of line interactive single-phase modules shortly,"
informed Jacobsen.
Speaking on the proposed entry into the single-phase market Jacobsen said,
"We are also into the lower KVA UPS because it's still a huge market and we are
seeing many areas of India untouched even after the presence of so many vendors.
We have seen a space and we are focusing more on C, D and E-class cities in the
future."
Socomec has divided its current business into two divisions namely
enterprise and general business, where three-phase UPS in the range of 8-60KVA
will be handled by channels and anything beyond 60KVA would be handled directly
by the enterprise team in Socomec.
Socomec has planned to tie-up with business partners, mainly the SIs and SPs
directly. "We are planning to tie-up with 17 business partners including
Bengaluru-based Zener Systems with whom we are associated for the past 16 years
to deal with the 8-60KVA UPS and more ranges. For the calendar year 2009,
Socomec is planning to tie-up with 80 business partners," informed Jacobsen.
The service portfolio for the UPS would be handled directly by the
Commissioning Inspection and Maintenance (CIM) team, which was supporting the
sales even during the times of Socomec's JV with Numeric. Socomec has made the
CIM team stronger and has enhanced its presence in 14 locations. The 60 member
CIM team would be supporting both the enterprise and general business division
in terms of service. "We have introduced a concept of T.Service to our customers
where the UPS would be remotely managed by the CIM team from our Chennai set-up
through remote telephone or web-based surveillance," Jacobsen informed. He also
said that Socomec has introduced a new concept where the service person within
the 50km radius will reach the spot within five hours to attend the faults
personally.