Korean Domination Is Complete

The most interesting phenomenon of the last five years has been the gradual
dominance of the Indian II industry by the Koreans. Without doubt, they have
marched far ahead of others in the country. In fact, companies like LG and
Samsung are virtually dominating a number of product categories in the
peripheral segment.

These two Korean giants have been intensifying their focus on products like
monitors, keyboards, hard disk drives, floppy drives, CD-ROM drives, DVD drives,
laser printers, multi-function devices etc. Interestingly, they have ensured
that their Japanese and Taiwanese competitors do not get a foothold in these
market segments.

Samsung is by far the biggest player, which has a finger in every pie.
Cashing in on its success in the consumer durables market, this Korean giant is
virtually rewriting the rules of the game in the peripherals sector also,
especially in the category of color monitors where it has grabbed a virtual
stranglehold of the market.

No other player, domestic or foreign, has so many models available in the
market as Samsung has. In fact, the company introduces a whole new range of
models before the competitors can time to react even to the previous
introductions. Overall, the company claims to have captured over 50% of the
monitor market in the country.

And now the notebook and the PC market have become the latest battleground in
addition to the peripheral market. Almost in tandem with each other, both LG and
Samsung have introduced a range of notebooks in the country.

First on the block was LG which unveiled PCs running on Linux. Almost at the
same time, the market witnessed PCs powered by Samsung under the buildurpc
program. While Samsung has for the moment scaled down its operations in the PC
segment, LG is powering ahead. It has made its intentions clear to be the number
one within the next two years.

However, the huge success and the resultant dominance of the Koreans has not
gone down too well with the domestic manufacturers who are crying foul, although
privately. They contend that MNCs like Samsung and LG are virtually dumping
their products in India and are throwing unlimited amounts of money to grab a
dominant market share. While it is a matter of debate as to how far is this
contention true, the fact remains that ultimately it is the consumer who is
getting a good deal.

It certainly won't be an exaggeration to say that ultimately it is the
customer who is getting better quality products at a great price point. This is
primarily due to the fact that companies like Samsung have introduced a whole
lot of great benefits for not only the customer but also the reseller. In the
process, everybody benefits.

Asim Raina