Store with ease

New Delhi Aug. 2: Hewlett Packard (H-P) today joined hands with Moser Baer India Ltd (Moser Baer), a leading manufacturer of removable data storage products, to bring H-P’s branded computer disk (CD) storage media into India and other South Asian Association for Regional Cooperation countries.

Industry mavens say the market for storage products in India is about $200 million. The Indian market for optical storage media products is growing at 50 per cent a year, making it one of the fastest growing regions in the world.

Moser Baer will manage the manufacturing, marketing and distribution of H-P’s branded digital video disk read only (DVD+R), DVD+RW (read and writeable), CD-R and CD-RW storage media. H-P will continue to oversee product quality, testing and branding compliance to ensure that the end product meets H-P’s strict standards.

Deepak Puri, chairman and managing director, Moser Baer India Ltd, said, “This agreement further strengthens the relationship between our two companies. H-P is globally identified with premium and quality product offering. The fact that media produced at our facilities will bear the H-P name is yet another example of our strong emphasis on product quality and ability to build a successful business franchise.”

“Consumers already trust H-P to provide top quality printing supplies to complement its digital printing products and expect the company to do the same for DVD and CD storage supplies,” he added.

Moser Baer is the third largest optical media manufacturer in the world.

With strong sales, marketing and supply chain expertise, the H-P Moser Baer partnership is expected to bring about a fusion of both reliable and high-quality offering at a more competitive retail pricing to consumers.

See Chin Teik, vice-president of consumer products and mobile business, Asia Pacific and Japan, H-P, said, “Many of the company’s customers were disappointed when the company ceased to provide the CD storage media it once offered. Re-entering the media storage market in partnership with Moser Baer allows H-P to focus on expanding its product portfolio to complement its DVD+R/+RW drive offerings. And, also to meet customer demand for high-quality, attractively priced storage media.”

Bhaskar Sharma, vice president — domestic sales and marketing, Moser Baer India Ltd, said, “We are excited to have H-P branded optical storage media in our fold. The association with a global brand like H-P will complement and further strengthen our existing product offering in the optical storage market. We expect H-P business in the Indian subcontinent to contribute Rs 1 billion to Moser Baer’s revenues by 2006.”

Moser Baer, headquartered in New Delhi, has successfully developed cutting-edge technologies for recordable optical media.