Calcutta, Nov. 25: Logitech, the $1.8-billion IT peripherals major, is targeting West Bengal with renewed vigour and plans to double its sales in the eastern region in the next six months.
At present, east contributes five per cent of the company’s sales in the country.
“Logitech is concentrating on increasing its presence in the region and the state. As part of the endeavour, we are also opening the first Logitech branded store which would be owned by us but managed by our channel partners in the country’s first e-mall being set up in the city,” said Moninder Jain, director, south Asia, Logitech Singapore Pte Limited.
Logitech, which earlier had a sizeable presence in the state, encountered visibility problems four years back when a few distributors were caught with counterfeit Logitech products.
The company’s business has grown by three times in the past two years. India comprises 50 per cent of Logitech’s south Asia turnover.
The company is experiencing unprecedented growth in high end products and 15 per cent of its sales turnover comes from that segment.
“As part of our initiative to provide greater thrust to such high end products, the company would be simultaneously launching its new products globally and in India,” Jain added.
The Indian personal computer (PC) market is around five million units and the market is almost equally divided between branded and assembled players.
While branded products like Dell, IBM and HP use their own peripherals, Logitech’s mouse, keyboards, web-cameras and iPod are widely used in assembled units.
Logitech, which is the second most popular brand for iPod speakers in the US after Bose, plans to become the leader in India.
Plans are also afoot to launch the world’s first rechargeable cordless keyboard in the country priced at Rs 14,000, it has also low-end keyboards starting from Rs 350.
Logitech has its manufacturing unit in China where the installed PC base is 70 million compared with 17 million in India.
The company, like many others in the field, wants the 12.5 per cent duty on web cameras to be waived and brought under PC peripherals.
