Panasonic India expects to close the current fiscal ending March 2020, with gross revenues of ₹12,000 crore on the back of six per cent growth, despite challenging macro-economic conditions.

The Japanese major on Thursday announced one of its “most ambitious projects” by foraying into the connected devices space, with the launch of its IoT and AI-enabled platform Miraie. The platform launch is backed with the launch of connected inverter air-conditioners, smart door bells and plugs and switches.

Manish Sharma, President & CEO, Panasonic India and South East Asia, said, “In financial year 2020-21, we expect nearly 25 per cent of our total consumer appliances revenues to come from our range of connected devices.”

The company said the connected devices range will be expanded to smart refrigerators and washing machines, besides geysers, fans and televisions in the coming months to give the full range of Connected Living Solutions.

“Overall, Panasonic in India (which includes all its entities in India) is on track to touch the ₹12,000-crore gross revenue-mark by March 2020, clocking a growth of about 5-6 per cent,” he added.

The company said with the new range of its connected AC and expects to see strong double digit growth in the fourth quarter of 2019-20 and first quarter of 2020-21 in the upcoming summer season.

Replying to a query on the growth expectations given the current macro-economic conditions, Sharma said, “I remain cautiously optimistic as I believe necessities which include appliances such as ACs, washing machines and refrigerators will continue to grow. However, in the TV space, which has become commodotised and is witnessing a rub-off of increase in entertainment consumption through smartphones and TVs, we will need to be slightly cautious.”

As a strategy, the Japanese major will aggressively focus on higher number of launches in TV sizes of 43-inch and above targeting urban consumers. “Our launches in the segment of sizes below 43 inch, we will be more focused on rural and semi-urban regions,” he added.

Coronavirus impact

On the impact of the outbreak of Coronavirus on components and supply chain, Sharma said, “So far inventory of components is good enough in the country for February and March. We are monitoring the situation carefully, if the situation continues in China for a longer term then there will be an impact but it is something we can deal with.”

He added that Chinese factories may begin operations by next week and the company can look at airlifting components to cut down on shipment time.