Asus India is looking to strengthen its market presence by adding 28 more stores to its network of 72 before the end of this year.
The Taiwanese technology giant is optimistic about its growth prospects in India, especially the South. Piyush Seth, Distribution and Commercial Manager, ASUS India, told BusinessLine that the company clocked a year-on-year growth of 32 per cent in 2019, while the consumer IT industry registered a de-growth of 13 per cent.
“Our endeavour is to strengthen our last-mile connect with users,” he said, without quantifying the investment that Asus has allocated for India. Seth was in the city at the launch of the company’s 72nd exclusive store at Saibaba Colony in Coimbatore.
“While it is among the many exclusive outlets for Asus in the country, this store incidentally is the first (in the country) with the ROG (Republic of Gamers) store as well,” he said. “On display is an array of products including those new to market, and prices ranging from ₹17,919 to over ₹2.49 lakh.”
He added, “Our vision is to emerge as the Nno.1 player in gaming in India and the world. And to get there, we are looking to ramp our network to 200 by the end of 2020.” “South is the key market for us, contributing to 30 per cent of our entire business,” he said. Seth further pointed out that 15 to 20 per cent of customers were price centric, looking for entry-level skews, while a majority sought innovative and cutting-edge ASUS products.
Besides the on-site service footprint, Asus collaborates with e-commerce platforms like Paytm and Flipkart to reach out to users.
“Around 30 per cent of our total sales is via such ecommerce platforms. This market is growing, but we intend to restrict the online business to 30 per cent,” Seth said.
S Karthikeyan, Managing Director, Bloom Electronics and owner of ASUS’ exclusive store, said however pointed out that customers walk-in, discuss in detail about a prospective purchase and price, but later resort to online purchase eventually. “While customers still prefer to touch and feel the product before the purchase, the online route appears an option. Awareness levels and expectations have gone up. The challenge lies in service quality and building relationship.”