Iris helps Goa save Rs 6 crore

It came as an euphoria when Goa's chief minister Manohar Parrikarr saved Rs 6 crore after he negotiated with computer distributors for supply of laptops under the ‘Cyberage Scheme' recently and to its credit Delhi based Iris Computers, the largest distributor of Lenovo's commercial computer, was the distributor facilitating these savings for the state.

Under this scheme, the state government provides free laptops and computers to those students studying in class eleven along with students of the ITI and polytechnics. Every year the state government selects top five brands and floats tender inviting bids from local IT traders. This time the brand Lenovo was chosen for supplying 16,000 laptops.

Sameer Chaudhary, senior vice president, sales, Iris Computers informed that it was the first time when Iris was the sole distributor for this project and able to convince the local partners with its offer. "Every year Ingram Micro used to get a pie but this time we sidelined all other distributors and delivered all laptops in under two months."

He was boasting that subsequently Iris gave Rs 26 crore business to its Goan partners.

Explaining about the issue, Vallabh Sardesai of Comptech Systems, one among the local partners in Goa who bid for this project and supplied 1200 units of laptops to the government, stated that since this year state government invited more people in bidding than the usual five, there was more competition.

He added, "We found that Lenovo as a vendor was giving better prices compared to other brands, so we pushed for it and later on, the state government approved it,"

It was this time that partners started selecting a distributor who could deliver a demand of 16,000 units of Lenovo to respective resellers in Goa. Sardesai said that Iris was a better option and subsequently all partners became party to it. He conceded, "Iris gave better distributor margins as well as better credit facilities and hence we opted in for this company."