Leading The Pack In Northeast

Over the years, IT retail has seen a phase of broad dissemination of markets

across East India leading to the development of spread-out markets particularly

in West Bengal, Orissa and Bihar. However, this is not the case in northeast.

Despite the diffused markets in the East, northeast India has undergone a phase

of consolidation of the IT retail market based in Guwahati.

The state capital of Assam, Guwahati has long been catering to the market

demands throughout the entire northeast region. Despite the competitive market

in Agartala and Tripura, Guwahati has evolved into the business center of the

entire northeast region. After the telecom industry, it is the IT sector that

has been growing steadily in the region primarily because of the thriving

oil-industry. It is helped by government sector investing in IT in the form of

retail purchases.

“Guwahati market not only caters to Assam, but the seven states as well.

Backed by the emergence of the SOHO segment and an organised channel community,

Guwahati is one of the crucial players in the entire East. In Tripura, most of

the stock comes from Guwahati,” said Subhash Modak, CEO, Computer Link,

highlighting the importance of Guwahati.

Backed by the strong presence of the government sector accounting as the

primary business client for IT retail in the region, a strong and consistent

end-user base has come into play recently since the last two years. With the

region becoming computer savvy with the expansion of IT training institutes,

Guwahati has started to develop at a steady 17 percent growth on a YoY basis.

Guwahati's uniqueness lies in catering to the local markets in Tripura,

Nagaland, Mizoram and Manipur.

Guwahati

FACT FILE Market size is 10,000 PCs per month IT market growing at a rate of 30% YoY

“Guwahati is the nerve center for IT retail in northeastern India. The market

caters to all the seven states in the region. However, this year, it has gone

down at a negative ratio because of the global slowdown and the pertinent

political problem, but it is a temporary phenomenon and will recover soon by mid

2009,” said GC Biswas, CEO, SD Infotech.

Having a strong presence of national distributors in Guwahati, the area is

under constant supervision by Rashi Peripherals, Ingram Micro and Redington.

Unlike other upcountry markets in the East, the distributors have a strong

supply base and a stretched supply line in Guwahati with three national

distributors having warehouses in the city, resulting in the bulk of the trade

taking place from this region.

“Guwahati has the potential to develop as a big market for IT retail. Even in

times when sales were down in the entire country especially the eastern markets

in particular, Guwahati maintained its regularity,” said Sanjay Sengupta,

Regional Manager-East, Gajshield while commenting on the region's dominant role

in the East. Market penetration has also been steady for the vendors with major

e-governance projects lined up. However, in this region, the government as well

as the PSUs resort to direct purchases from vendors or national distributors

instead of routing it through the channel space.

“The SOHO segment accounts for the majority of the consumer segment from the

channel space. Last FY, there has been 100 percent record growth in the laptop

sales with HP having the usual lead followed by Lenovo and LG. Now, on an

average 10,000 PCs are sold every month in Guwahati only,” commented Pawan Kumar

Agarwal, CEO, Datamation Services.

Unlike other upcountry markets in the East which caters to basic consumer and

a self-contained niche segment demands, Guwahati is strong on the accessories

front recording a staggering growth at 124 percent backed by a brawny printer

market with a growth rate at 40 percent on YoY basis. It is predicted that the

market, even under the pressure generated by the present economic slowdown will

continue to grow at a rate of 30 percent YoY.

Avishek Rakshit



avishekr@cybermedia.co.in