Canon shoots past the Rs 1000 crore barrier

Old wines taste better. Companies also
start performing better as they age. It's proving true for Canon
India. After twelve years of existence in India, on October 28, Canon
saw its revenue for the year 2010 (Canon's FY coincides with the
CY) touch the Rs 1000 crore mark. While celebrating the occasion on
the momentous day with some senior editors, Alok Bhardwaj, Sr VP,
Canon India obviously sounded upbeat; Canon further commemorated the
occasion by billing the first order for the next Rs 1000 crore to its
iconic brand ambassador Sachin Tendulkar in a gala occasion on
October 29. Bharadwaj informed that having breached
the Rs 1000 crore-barrier by end of October, Canon India is well on
course to meet its target of Rs 1260 crore by the fiscal end in
December. Both the camera and printer business is expected to
contribute Rs 450 crore each to this kitty with the rest coming from
the VIS business. The managed print service segment itself
contributed Rs 300 crore. Even the future looks rosy, with Bhardwaj
predicting Canon India to garner the next Rs 1000 crore in two years
(in stark contrast to the twelve years it took for the first 1000)
and reach Rs 2000 crore by 2012. Not just that, he predicts Canon
India to cross the one billion dollar mark (nearly 300 percent
growth) by 2015.

The thousand crore barrier was
breached, thanks in no small measures to the strides made by the
printer business. In the laser printer segment itself, Canon
increased its market share from 18 percent last year to 35 percent
this time. While Bhardwaj admits that it would be unrealistic to
expect Canon to sustain this sort of growth YoY (in terms of market
share) the momentum would also not slacken significantly. The 2900
series, that has been instrumental in helping in much of this growth,
however is likely to be phased out over the next year. “We are
however well prepared with our other models to offset any impact of
the 2900 phase out; besides, we have now gained significant mindshare
amongst enterprises, who do not also shift vendor loyalty at a very
short notice,” added Bhardwaj. Canon has been extremely passionate
about its channel partners too and has been striving hard to offer
them maximum margins, sometimes as high as five times its biggest
competitor HP. In fact, the newly built channel loyalty has gone a
long way in Canon India's stupendous success in the last few
quarters. Last but not the least, Bharadwaj is not loathe to admit
that some of HP's strategic miscalculations and internal
restructuring has also helped Canon. While the market numbers bear
out the fact that Canon India's significant growth was at the expense
of HP's market share loss, Bharadwaj further reasons that HP suffered
primarily due to some forecasting miscalculations by HP IPG during
slowdown as well as the departure of some senior HP personnel.
Coupled with this, several channel partners being unhappy with HP's
wafer-thin margins, they wholeheartedly courted Canon. Both Canon and
its brand ambassador
Tendulkar had great 2010. Hope the trend continues in 2011. India
then wins the World Cup and Canon enjoys another stupendous year.