HCL eyes 20% laptop marketshare by 2011

Eyeing a big catch in the fast growing laptop segment, HCL is planning to
emerge as a strong player in the space, targeting 20 percent marketshare over a
span of two years.

On the sidelines of the 'HCL Mobile Excitement' campaign in Punjab and
Haryana, the company had declared that the sales in the laptop segment is
growing at a rate of 22 percent against 3.2 percent in the desktop space.

“In the next two years, we are targeting to increase our marketshare in the
laptop segment from about seven percent to 20 percent, and we are voraciously
campaigning to achieve this,” said George Paul, Executive VP, HCL Infosystems.

With 6.4 percent marketshare in the laptop segment presently, the company is
reported to have sold seven million units across the country, out of which 35
percent of the total sales accounted in the laptop segment.

Company officials in HCL Infosystem's eastern division said that the company
has recently grown very aggressive over its channel plans and is eyeing big
channel players to emerge as a leader.

“Considering other brands in the market, RoI is much higher on HCL laptops.
We have good presence in the enterprise and SMB sector, although most of our
deployments are based on desktops. To have a steady 20 percent growth on a YoY
basis, we need to seriously work on our corporate clients and focus on end-user
segment, which will lead to increase in our channel base,” a senior company
official in the East said.

However, the channel community, at least in the East is not very convinced
about HCL's plans to emerge in the top three market leader space.

“The acceptability of HCL is pretty low in the end-user segment. Although
their products are good and price is stable in the market, sales of HCL laptops
and to an extent, desktops are pretty low. Also, I have not found considerable
aggressiveness on HCL's part in the channel space,” said a dealer based in
Kolkata on condition of anonymity.

Commenting over the same, Praveen Pugalia of Computer Gallery said, “This
year, in the laptop space, two companies has lost considerable marketshare and
Dell has taken on the lead exploiting the market situation. Also, sales in
Toshiba have increased considerably by over 400 percent on an MoM basis after
the company appointed Redington as its distributor and secured a price lead.”

In the backdrop of Toshiba and Dell taking the lead in the emerging market
scenario, numerous issues related to HCL's service has cropped up recently, with
partners doubting an expansion plan under the resource constraint of the
company.

As after-sales service issues continue to plague the company, and HCL service
centers refusing after-sales services, dealers across the nation feel that HCL
needs to work on its post-sales support in the first place and then focus on
increasing its marketshare and channel presence.