Canon to appoint more premium and empowered partners

In order to have a better focus and reach in the market, Canon India Ltd is appointing more premium partners and empowered partners for its various product categories. It is also going for city-wise premium partners for its special product lines such as digicams, laser printers and all-in-ones (MFDs). "We have identified cities like Chennai, Coimbatore, Cochin, Trivandrum, Hyderabad, Vishakapatnam and Bangalore for this program and we will announce our partners' list shortly," said an official of Canon. In digicam, the company will have exclusive line of partners separately for the photo segment and the IT segment.

Meanwhile, Canon is also becoming aggressive in its consumables business by appointing more Canon Empowered Partners across Tamil Nadu. The initiative is being taken out jointly by Canon and PELIKAN Office Automation Pvt Ltd, an exclusive premium partner for consumables in Tamil Nadu. The Empowered Partners will get price benefits and will also be eligible for special schemes promoted by the company.

According to NS Subramanian (Murali), Proprietor of PELIKAN, "The new initiative will help us double our targets and we are planning to do Rs 75 lakh of business every month. In Chennai, we are appointing Vijex & Co, Uttam Marketing, Sethia International, Impact Business and ACDC as our empowered partners. Similarly, we are in the process of appointing partners in Trichy, Coimbatore, Madurai, Salem, Tirunelveli, Vellore and other important cities of Tamil
Nadu."

Canon is very clear about reaching all parts of the country and ensuring product availability everywhere. "We have fixed targets for our partners based on the market potential and we never want to promote too much of competition amongst our channel partners," said
Murali.

In addition, Canon has also included its fax cartridges (BX3) in the consumables business.

S Gopikrishna