Summit to push Acer's optical products, LCD monitors

Acer Peripherals has appointed Delhi-based Summit Infotech Ltd to push its optical products and LCD monitors particularly in the northern belt. With both the product categories being niche, the appointment assumes significance, since the job here will be to create the market rather than just pushing boxes.

Said Sandeep Nair, MD, Acer Peripherals (India) Pvt Ltd, "Being niche products, the vendor has to be able to sell solutions to customers and sometimes this entails creating a market. Summit has a good track record as far as niche products are concerned, since it is handling products like Adobe and Quark, which are essentially niche products."

In fact, it is a role that Summit enjoys and thrives on. One of its major success stories have been Umax scanners which has maintained the number one slot for scanners in the country for three consecutive years. The success here has been attributed to the fact that Summit took on the distributorship of Umax scanners when the market for scanners was relatively nascent.

According to Yashpal Bindra, Director (Sales), Summit, "It is easier to create a market and gain marketshare than following the leader where gaining inroads is much more difficult. Once the market exists, the only way for the distributor to make inroads is through price points and it hurts the bottomline when one resorts to cutting margins."

It is only now that HP has lashed back with its high-profile campaign targeted at SMEs and the upcountry markets that the Umax scanner marketshare over the past two quarters has shrunk to about 30 percent from 35 percent earlier. But Bindra says that Umax scanners have not suffered any real setback in terms of numbers due to market expansion.

And it is due to this market expansion activity that existing players like Samsung and LG have welcomed the entry of Acer Peripherals into the LCD monitors and optical products market. The challenge before these vendors is two fold--to educate the customer and the high price points. And for both these issues, market expansion is critical. Elaborated Ajay Kapila, VP (Sales and Marketing), LG Electronics India, "Acer's entry is a positive development since it is a restricted market we are addressing for these products. So we shall all be targeting the same customers and it will help in market development."

In other words, with more and more vendors raving about the virtues of new product categories it will be easier to convince customers. Concurs Vivek Prakash, National Sales and Marketing Manager, Samsung Electronics India Pvt Ltd, "With more players, market development will be faster bringing in volumes and thereby price cuts."

Service is a critical aspect for the success of these products since both the LCD monitors and the CD-RW cannot be repaired and has to be replaced in case of damage. Therefore, customer support will be a critical factor in determining the winner in these products. For instance, Samsung who claims to have the largest marketshare in these segments, attributes it to the fact that it has a large base of service support for its products.

Recognizing the criticality of service in these kind of products, Bindra said that Summit along with Acer will kick-start a training program for its service engineers from the last week of January.

However, it is also to be noted that most of the Samsung sales in these product categories take place in the direct selling model. Justifying the reason, Prakash added, "Since these are products that require customer education, it is but logical that most of the marketing is done by Samsung itself. The definition of channel is essentially to ensure reach for achieving volume sales."

So, is the Acer strategy wrong? "No", countered Nair. "We are 100 percent channel driven and our partners play a significant role in the success of our products. We are selective about our partners and are confident of Summit. The message we would like to send is that despite our wide array of products, our approach to marketing is very focused. For instance, Tech Pacific handles only our optical products while we have recently appointed Godrej & Boyce to distribute our DLP projectors."

Summit will target the corporate sector, SOHO segment and the government for the two product categories. It is a challenge that the company is looking forward to. "For one," said Bindra, "the Acer Peripherals brand awareness is low. Secondly, the product range itself is niche and requires market creation. Third, we have to ensure the reach of the products which we are confident with a dealer base of 250 across the country."

(CNS)