Financial Daily from THE HINDU group of publications
Friday, Mar 21, 2003
Financial Daily from THE HINDU group of publications Friday, Mar 21, 2003 |
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Info-Tech
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Alliances & Joint Ventures Marketing - Channels and Franchises Emerson joins hands with Ingram Our Bureau
BANGALORE, March 20 EMERSON Network Power (formerly Tata Liebert Ltd), the power protection company, has tied-up with Ingram Micro, the largest global wholesale provider of technology products, for nationwide distribution of its products. Emerson, which has been in India since 1999, had been selling through business partners (BPs) till now. The BPs would continue to sell, but to customers who opt for the 6-60-kva products. Ingram, on the other hand, would target the 1, 2 and 3-kva market (mainly for networks with up to ten PCs), said Mr Shrikant Bapat, Country Champion, Emerson India. The company hopes to capitalise on the expected surge in demand in the SME (small and medium) segment for UPS. Ingram is expected to help the company tap the Government, educational institutions and PSU segments, where Emerson has traditionally been weak. Interestingly, it also sells products from Emerson's rival, APC. Mr N.Y. Prasad, Managing Director, Ingram, said that it would not really pose any problems, as the company's strategy had been to sell multi-vendor products in all groups. For instance, it is a distributor for both HP and IBM. Internally, Ingram has different sets of employees selling similar products from competing companies. "At the end of the day, it is the customer's decision which stands," he said. Accurate figures for the UPS segment are hard to come by with a large number of grey market players. Mr Bapat estimated that the 1-3-kva market in India was around Rs 300 crore, while the 6-60-kva market was in the region of Rs 450-600 crore. He refused to divulge any figures relating to Emerson, saying that only market research companies had put its market share at 25 per cent.
`War may delay buying decisions'
THE Indian IT industry, which has been prepared for the eventuality of a war, was not expected to show any immediate reaction, Mr N.Y. Prasad of Ingram said. "If the war is a short and sweet one, there should not be any effect," he said. However, there would be an impact if it means higher petrol and diesel prices, he opined. Most vendors who have long-term contracts would be unable to pass on the hike in prices to customers and their only option would be to cut down on expenses, including IT products. "Buying decisions could get postponed, impacting the IT industry," he guessed. So far, the Government has been a big IT spender, followed by finance (banks and insurance companies) and telecom companies (specially the newer players) in that order. The slowdown in IT demand has mainly been in the corporate sector. The hardcore manufacturing industry, a big spender in 1999-00, showed a definite slowdown as far as spending on IT sector is concerned, despite showing overall growth. The home segment has remained where it was. "The sentiment is that they'll start looking up," Mr Prasad said, though he declined to make any predictions at all.
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