Digital retail wakes up to a new dawn in India
Buyers in India and elsewhere in Asia are splurging on gadgets like never before. Here's why.
By Shelley Singh, TNN |
NEW DELHI: Tech retailers will love to lap it. Buyers in India and elsewhere in Asia are splurging on gadgets like never before. And the boom is set to get bigger in the coming months.
Just a decade back, a mere 11% of affluent Asians owned laptops. In ’06, that figure has grown to 35.7%, representing a 225% increase. Around Y2K, the ownership of desktop computers was 44.2% in Asia. It’s now 64.1%, a rise of 45%. And in India specifically, the growth is faster than in Asia as far as devices like desktops are concerned. That is thanks to lower costs and a strong preference to go digital.
Synovate, a market research company, surveyed the growth of some technologies and products over a 10-year period. About 11.3% respondents of the survey (it covers, among other things, media consumption, products and purchase intention) say they will purchase a laptop or notebook in the next 12 months.
K Jaishankar, managing director, Ingram Micro India says: “I do see the landscape for tech retail change dramatically over the next 12 months. More people will buy cameras, laptops, pen drives, handy cams and other technology products.”According to the survey, Indian buyers intend purchasing high-end electronic goods like laptops/notebook computers, hand-held PCs, mobile phones and handsets with internet access, flatscreen TVs, LCD and Plasma TVs, digital still cameras and so on.
Synovate India’s managing director Alok Shanker says: “Indians are quick to adopt. And after liberalisation of the electronic media, Indians now have access to innovation in technology. Knowledge coupled with rising incomes among Indians is leading to a spurt in buying and acquisition of high-end technology devices. Booming economy and rising incomes bodes well for high-end technology manufacturers in India.”
Adds Steve Garton, global head of media for Synovate, “The survey shows how digital has taken off - and taken a firm hold - among the affluent population.” The mobile phone ownership has moved from 46.8% to 86.3% over 10 years (a rise of 84%), and is much higher in some of the markets surveyed. Singapore’s mobile phone ownership is 95% and Hong Kong, Sydney, Bangkok, Kuala Lumpur, Seoul and Taipei all have over 90% ownership.
The Indian market is among the fastest growing, adding about 5m new users a month. Not surprisingly, it is one of the most attractive markets for handset makers. Internet is not far behind in adding new users. Internet is now accessed by 71% of Synovate respondents, an increase of 132% since 1997.
Just a decade back, a mere 11% of affluent Asians owned laptops. In ’06, that figure has grown to 35.7%, representing a 225% increase. Around Y2K, the ownership of desktop computers was 44.2% in Asia. It’s now 64.1%, a rise of 45%. And in India specifically, the growth is faster than in Asia as far as devices like desktops are concerned. That is thanks to lower costs and a strong preference to go digital.
Synovate, a market research company, surveyed the growth of some technologies and products over a 10-year period. About 11.3% respondents of the survey (it covers, among other things, media consumption, products and purchase intention) say they will purchase a laptop or notebook in the next 12 months.
K Jaishankar, managing director, Ingram Micro India says: “I do see the landscape for tech retail change dramatically over the next 12 months. More people will buy cameras, laptops, pen drives, handy cams and other technology products.”According to the survey, Indian buyers intend purchasing high-end electronic goods like laptops/notebook computers, hand-held PCs, mobile phones and handsets with internet access, flatscreen TVs, LCD and Plasma TVs, digital still cameras and so on.
Synovate India’s managing director Alok Shanker says: “Indians are quick to adopt. And after liberalisation of the electronic media, Indians now have access to innovation in technology. Knowledge coupled with rising incomes among Indians is leading to a spurt in buying and acquisition of high-end technology devices. Booming economy and rising incomes bodes well for high-end technology manufacturers in India.”
Adds Steve Garton, global head of media for Synovate, “The survey shows how digital has taken off - and taken a firm hold - among the affluent population.” The mobile phone ownership has moved from 46.8% to 86.3% over 10 years (a rise of 84%), and is much higher in some of the markets surveyed. Singapore’s mobile phone ownership is 95% and Hong Kong, Sydney, Bangkok, Kuala Lumpur, Seoul and Taipei all have over 90% ownership.
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The Indian market is among the fastest growing, adding about 5m new users a month. Not surprisingly, it is one of the most attractive markets for handset makers. Internet is not far behind in adding new users. Internet is now accessed by 71% of Synovate respondents, an increase of 132% since 1997.
Other technologies have become prominent only within the last five years: MP3 players are now owned by 38.7% of the affluent Asians surveyed, a growth of 116% since ’01 — with a further 7.3% intending to buy one in the next 12 months. On the flip-side, the mini-disc player has suffered somewhat at the hands of the MP3 with ownership declining 34% since ’01 — 14.6% of the respondents now own one.
Ownership of digital still cameras has increased 127% over the past five years, from 23.6% in ’01 to 53.6%, meaning more than half of all affluent Asians now have one. There is a further 6.1% of the population that expects to purchase one in the next year. If you include people with digital camera functionality on their mobile phones, a hefty 72.4% of respondents now have the ability to take digital photographs.
Digital video camera acquisitions are also on the rise. In ’01, 22.1% owned these items, rising 98% to 43.7% in ’06.
This gadget spending is fuelling a technology retail boom in India. Tata subsidiary Infinity Retail has just opened its Croma retail stores and an outlay of Rs 400 crore to open 100 such stores by ’10.
SanDisk, the $2.3bn supplier of data storage cards, plans to roll out products in 2,000 stores in coming weeks. While HCL Infosystems plans to open 60-100 digital lifestyle stores to cater to the growing technology products market.
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