India the only market in Asia pacific where Canon lags HP
Bibhu Ranjan Mishra / Bangalore Oct 28, 2012, 00:15 IST
Digital imaging company Canon has launched a slew of initiatives with the aim to become the dominant player in the Indian inkjet printer market in the next three years.
The Japanese company, which stood at the number-two position in this category in India with a market share of 23 per cent in the third quarter this year (according to CyberMedia Research), is looking to introduce newer range of inkjet printers that would reduce the costs of printing.
The company is also planning to increase the Canon brand stores to 300 by 2014-end from 80 now. Canon brand stores sell the company’s products starting from cameras to printers. Canon plans to make its products available in 2,500 multi-brand stores by 2015-end from 850 now.
•By 2014-end: Number of Canon brand stores to increase to 300 from 80 now
•By 2015-end: Plans to make products available in 2,500 multi-brand stores from the 850 now
“We had seen phenomenal growth in the inkjet category in India during the last one year by improving our market share from 16 per cent in 2011 to 23 per cent in the Q3 of 2012. We are optimistic that the strong marketing initiatives we have undertaken and the new range of ink efficient printers we are planning to launch in near future would help us to become the leader in this space by 2015,” Alok Bharadwaj, Senior Vice President of Canon India told Business Standard.
According to CyberMedia Research, HP was the number one player in the inkjet printer category in India with a market share of 51 per cent followed by Canon, in the third quarter of CY2012. However, in the Asia Pacific region, Canon is the number one player in the inkjet printer category with a share of 41 per cent followed by HP at 36 per cent (as of Q2 of CY2012), according to research and analyst firm IDC. India is the only country in Asia pacific where Canon lags behind HP.
The inkjet printer market in India which stood at 1.21 million units in 2011 is estimated to reach 1.26 million (Rs 1,000 crore in value term) in 2012. During the same time, the laser printer category which accounts for about 55 per cent of the overall printer market is estimated to become 1.6 million units (Rs 2,000 crore in value term).
However, the Indian customers are gradually shifting their preference from laser printers to inkjet owing to significant reduction in the running cost (printing cost of one sheet of paper). For example, the running cost for inkjet printers which used to be Rs 2.50 per black and white printing as compared to Rs 1.00 in case of laser printer, has now come down to about Rs 0.91 paise.
The ink efficient range of printers introduced by leading players such as HP and Canon has significantly brought down the cost of printing.
“While our inkjet category of printers was earlier mostly used by household users, we are now seeing this getting significant acceptance among the small office home office (SOHO) category. We are using our strong sales network that is already selling our copier multi-functional products to expand inkjet printers among SMEs and enterprises,” said Bharadwaj.
Canon India is expecting to close 2012 with revenues of Rs 2,000 crore, a growth of 27 per cent over the previous year.
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