COVER STORY-CHANNEL

BRAND SUPPORT HAS BEEN REALLY COMMENDABLE: CHANNEL

One thing which we all agree that traditional partners have really clapped the brands efforts during the lockdown. Though channel saw toughest time in the history of their business during both lockdowns, but brands successfully managed to support partners on all front.

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VENDOR SUPPORT

The distribution houses are seeking the best possible support from their vendors to meet the market demand and fulfill the orders. Commented about the support they are getting from vendors, Rajesh Goenka, Director, Sales & Marketing, RP tech India said, “While there is a global shortage of stocks, vendors are doing their best to get maximum stock allocation for India. Even if we do may not get 100 allocations, we are garnering reasonable stock to fulfil technology needs of Indian customers.”

“The support from our vendors is excellent, we have better understanding with every vendor on the stocking norms which is always in sync with market demand and this help us in keeping our Supply Chain Management (SCM) smooth. Likewise we have base margins understanding with every vendor while signing our distribution agreement. We plan our SCM & pricing structure periodically so that base margin is taken care off,” said by Ketan Patel, Chairman and Managing Director, Creative Peripherals.

“TAG have been quite fortunate to have Vendors like GALAX, TEAMGROUP, FRACTAL who has been very much supportive toward us and our channel partners during

this difficult time. I would like to mention one of our vendor saying “The situation is BAD, We don’t push sales for now. Please take care of yourselves and family at priority and do what is Best in your Business interest.” For TAG and its Vendors, Priority was to keep the wheels going and protect our Channel partners,” stated by Hanuman Rajpurohit, General Manager, Technology And Gadgets (TAG).

Whereas Prashanth G J, TechnoBind commented, “Support from vendors is always there. Some of our Tech alliances really supported us very well in these pandemic times and it goes a long way in showing the spirit of partnership. As long as we are mutually adding value to each other sporadic issues like margins or inventory or credit days become a nonevent.”

“When a brand, an organisation keeps it’s associates first for 2 decades, they get to observe the equal force being reciprocated. All our vendors had been really supportive with our fluid model and concept. Be it fluctuating supply, stocking or burst supply, they had been all hand in hand with our vision and requirements,” added Atul Gupta, CEO & Chairman, RX Infotech Pvt. Ltd.

Vinesh Pulse, National Sales Manager for India, element14 stated, “element14 has a comprehensive portfolio of the world’s leading suppliers and has been working closely with them to access additional stock to fulfil orders and support customers as they move to produce products/equipment’s at scale, either for completely new designs or to ramp up existing production.”

“The ability to continue to operate, and support element14’s customers, has been assured by the efforts of many individuals – our vendors, those coming onto site each day to work in our distribution centres, and our sales and product teams at home, working together as one. element14, as part of the global Farnell group, and an Avnet company, has leveraged its strong relationships with the leading manufacturers across the globe to support customers throughout “We have been running various partner-centric programs to support the business since the first phase of lockdown was announced in 2020. This value-added support to the channel helped us to keep the business up and running. We launched Green Zone and Orange Zone offers to help channel partners kick start their business,” said Rajesh Goenka, Director, Sales & Marketing, RP tech India. “We also launched an intensive marketing campaign to promote Work from Home (WFH) and Learn from Home (LFH) solutions among customers. All these consistent efforts enabled us to ensure business continuity and profitability during the past 2 years.”

“With the start of new year, we started with a bang by organizing a virtual roadshow for our partners - Creative Connect 2021, it’s a legacy we continued from 2019-20, basically a multi city roadshow to showcase our product offerings to our business partners, due to lockdown we went live and experienced overwhelming response from more than 500 partners & entire fraternity across India” Ketan Patel, Chairman and Managing Director, Creative Peripherals. These tough times is an eye opener for every organization to think out of the way for better opportunities that we could not even think about during normal times, so we launched our own brand called BSafe with all essential products at very competitive price with quick turnaround. Every months & quarters we have been trying in these trying times, to think and add value irrespective of business, to add value for employees, partners, friends, family & society to stay safe against Covid-19, thus we organized a vaccination drive on 10th June 2021 and 449 people were vaccinated including employees, near and dear.”

“Unlike during the last year, this year the lockdowns were in a phased manner. Most of the time some or the other markets were operating. The Companies like TAG operating at National level, had scope for keep supplying to the markets which were open under restrictions. Hanuman Rajpurohit, General Manager, Technology And Gadgets (TAG) commented, “As the transportation was working, managed to keep the supply ON. We tried supporting the channel partners by delivering the material directly to the End customer on behalf of the Dealers. This helped the channel partners to keep taking orders. E-tail partners who sell via their own websites were under advantage in this critical time. Also we at TAG run schemes and incentives for our offline partners for making some extra margins to keep going in this tough time.”

“We were actually prepared. Ever since the first lockdown last April we were more of a hybrid work environment and for us when the lockdowns hit us it was pretty smooth adjusting ourselves. Having promoted collaboration tools in the market over the last year we had ourselves invested in these tools and the effect of this lockdown was not really felt at all,” stated Prashanth G J, CEO, TechnoBind.

“Optimism and positivity are our core operating values, and we used the last lockdown as a business training ground. As soon as restrictions started sprouting in the market this year, we modified our model and shifted the focal point to digital spectrum. Moreover, we used the time to engage and create PR with our partners, refining our threads and training the sales force in order to get them ready for the new market reality” added Atul Gupta, CEO & Chairman, RX Infotech Pvt. Ltd.

Vinesh Pulse, National Sales Manager for India, element14 said, “Right at the beginning of the pandemic we worked quickly to ensure that the teams had the technology to work from home, and this has supported the business as the situation continued to

this period. The strength of these relationships have enabled the business to support customers with essential components for medical equipment in the early days of the pandemic, and to continue to support customers with shipments of semiconductors from stock today,” added further by Vinesh Pulse.

Vendors have been very prompt in recent times to extend all possible support to their partners. All major distributors express their happiness about brand’s initiatives during this unprecedented times. DP Sinha, Graphline Computers stated, “We are quite happy with the brand’s support to us especially in last one year. I feel margin is not an issue currently but real issue is supply. Venders are not able to fulfil demand more than 25% currently. I expect brands to work on to make a balance between demand and supply for Indian market.”

CHANNEL ENGAGEMENT

change. Although some of our people did begin to return into the office at certain stages, the majority of our office-based teams continue to work from home for the majority of their working week.”

Vinesh Pulse, element14 further added, “Yet alongside the challenge of the pandemic we have also more recently been working in a market with under-capacity of semiconductors – which has created its own challenges for many. As a High Service Distributor, we typically deal in much lower volumes than broad line distributors and hold high levels of stock to fulfil these smaller orders. This means that when high-volume distributors struggle to meet large orders due to increased demand on a model that is largely “buy to lead time”, we have still been busy fulfilling customer orders from stock, leveraging our global warehouse network. We have also been investing heavily in inventory over the last 18 months and are well prepared to support our customers, wjt extensive orders with suppliers placed in advance. Our priority throughout the COVID-19 pandemic and today is to ensure that we are supporting existing customers and those who seek to have a long term relationship with us. More recently, we have put in place some inventory controls to ensure that we can do this, and are watchful of resellers coming to clear out stock which they will then hold customers to ransom for.”

The lockdown during 2nd wave hampered the business operations on a huge basis. Distributors were struggling to deliver the orders on time. Speaking about the challenges during the lockdowns, DP Sinha, Managing Director, Graphline Computers Pvt. Ltd. said, “We were also closed during lockdown to support government efforts in fight against pandemic. Still we managed to grab some opportunities and delivered few boxes on better margin.”

OPPORTUNITIES TO GRAB

“The pandemic has brought several opportunities for the distribution market as different consumer segments present huge demand for technology products. Elaborating about the opportunities in the region, Rajesh Goenka, RP tech India said, “WFH and LFH will continue to drive the business as more people and organizations shift to virtual platforms. Apart from that networking and storage segments will contribute to the growth of the IT hardware industry due to the increase in demand for connectivity and storage solutions. Computer peripherals and accessories segments will also have growth potentials in the next 1-2 years.

“Every challenge opens the door for better opportunity, last year on 5th Aug we launched India’s first B2B e-Commerce platform for partners. This platform is for all the partners of different segment like IT, Imaging, Lifestyle, Gaming & Security. CKart is not classified based on brands we do, it’s an open platform for partners to list their brands & products with more brownie points like product training material, marketing collaterals just a click away. There are more modules that ease daily business but Seller module, E-Commerce Platform (White Labelling) & Drop shipment is like cherry on the cake” said Ketan Patel, Creative Peripherals. “To share with you some quick numbers of CKart success, rounding off in one year we have recorded 180 Crores with more than 13.5K orders, so far 800+ partners are doing business with on monthly basis and to add more monthly average of 80 partner are getting associated with CKart.”

After the first Lockdown in 2020, the market saw a huge potential due to WFH culture. Hanuman Rajpurohit, TAG added, “The requirement for a basic system setup at home become a necessity. The demand for High-End PC’s increased exponentially. Also due to rise in the Crypto Currency mining trend in the start of 2021, the requirements for High-End Graphic Cards, PSU, HDD and SSD went up. The Gamers who traditionally used to play in Gaming Café’s felt need for a Gaming PC setup at Home. Due to all these factors, the demand for components was on growth pattern. Taking forward this growth trend, TAG has been successful in signing New Distribution Brands, which will be announced shortly.”

“Market opportunities are on the rise and all-around – one should be just aware of how to dig for these opportunities. The legacy way of selling will not help in generating more opportunities. In today’s context more than ever a seller needs to be tuned to the business pain points of the customer including the hidden ones. And if he is able to match his technology offering to help the customer solve this pain point then there is an opportunity to play and these are abundant if rightly done. The opportunities range from the themes of WFH (collaboration tools, remote support, secured access, and endpoint backup) to Cyber Security (Data Encryption, Cloud Security, Zero Trust, and Access Management) just to name a few. The cloud as a play itself has innumerable opportunities that we are TechnoBind are helping partners with. Right from migrating to the cloud to manage the data on the cloud to securing it and finally protecting that data – TechnoBind has a solid stack play which is helping partners leverage this opportunity,” stated Prashanth G J, TechnoBind.

Atul Gupta, RX Infotech Pvt. Ltd. commented, “For a brand like Lapcare with its huge product portfolio, the possibilities and opportunities are vast. We move ahead with a ‘room for improvement’ attitude, be it our supply chain, sales model, marketing tactics or other segments of the working model. The market is evolving more than ever now across the market segments based on Demographic, Psychographic and Behavioural grounds. Keeping the product development, business strategy and marketing approach aligned to it with a dynamic mindset is what we focus on.”

“As the world begins to manage the virus better, supported by the recent rollout of vaccination programmes, we are expecting the industry to turn the corner and anticipate increased demand in sectors such as medical, IoT and Industrial IoT as well as 5G technologies, smart energy and automotive which would include electric vehicles (EVs) as people look to get moving again while avoiding the increased risk of infection associated with public transport” stated Vinesh Pulse, element14. “The rise in demand for EVs will also cause a knock-on increase in the demand for charging stations and greater investment in battery technologies. Alongside this, we don’t expect that increased demand for work-from-home and entertain-at-home technologies will decrease. This demand surged in the early days of the pandemic and filled a gap in demand for semiconductors as the traditional market paused in the face of lockdowns. More recently we have seen traditional demand bounce back, creating challenges in the market for semiconductors and the extension of lead times.”

As now the market is picking up but still the organizations are on remote work model which will stay here for longer. Ultimately this brings huge growth opportunities for the channel partners. Commenting on the growth opportunities, DP Sinha, Graphline Computers added, “I see good business opportunities for laptop segment because even after lockdown corporates are follow-

ing WFH mode and they are buying laptop for their employees to support work from Home model amid current pandemic.”

CURRENT CHALLENGES IN THE DISTRIBUTION BUSINESS

The pandemic has caused numerious challenges on the front of business continuity. The business operations have become complex and the channel partners are making all possible efforts to surpass the challenges. Rajesh Goenka, RP tech India said, “The restrictions on physical movement and transportation will continue to be a challenge till the pandemic situation comes under control. Apart from that products scarcity and subsequent price rise are adversely hampering the business. We are closely monitoring the situation and external factors that influence the product availability and price.”

“Distribution of products seems to be a simple business however its quite complex when it comes to execution and day to day operations, one has to be pro & quick decision maker in solving these daily challenges, this comes from experience, being into distribution from past 30 years is an advantage for us to overcome. However there are few challenges that are well known like product shortage, imports, transportation & freight cost” added Ketan Patel, Creative Peripherals. “We are sure that this is just a journey and lesson for lifetime. We have also experienced that brand & product promotional activities has gone drastically from physical activity to digital event, and now these digital events turnout is less compared to activities in 1st lockdown in 2020 due to lost their interest, it seems like people are also looking forward for normal norms or back to normalcy.”

Despite all the positives, the major challenge is the Covid19 itself, It is not something which will end so soon. Some Channel partners and Sales executives are not with us anymore, which is permanent loss. Hanuman Rajpurohit, TAG commented, “Physical connect with the partners is going to be a challenge in the near future. We have to prepare ourselves. The way of doing business will change substantially. Maintaining a healthy balance of stocks and sales is very important. On a Positive note – I would say only one thing, we have been into one of the most fortunate Industries around. Many industries have seen a major crackdown during this period. We have to be positive and keep going helping our customers, employees and the ecosystem to maintain sustainability.”

“WFH has changed the dynamics of business continuity completely. All these years’ customers were happy protecting the data within their DC and building an alternate DC for access in times of disaster. But with WFH the data is literally spread everywhere and the need to access the data is again spread out – so along with tech solutions, also needed is a re-look at the process of business continuity” stated Prashanth G J, TechnoBind.

“With such an explosive business landscape, come opportunities and come challenges in equal ratio. Neither could be neglected. The market focus is continuously fluctuating in accordance with the govt. restrictions, lockdowns, and reforms. For one, it is very hard to keep logistics and supply-demand balance in check. The gap between the two can increase the variable cost. Same applies to marketing focus and other departments. The only way to go ahead is developing a fluid and elastic business model which could mould into the ever-changing business scenario, quickly and efficiently” added Atul Gupta, RX Infotech Pvt. Ltd.

Vinesh Pulse, element14 said, “The last eighteen months have been unlike any other and without doubt, COVID-19 has presented purchasers with a major challenge in sourcing electronic components and products when they want them. Most supply chains are well founded and usually work effectively, however, COVID-19 exposed weaknesses and the need for greater flexibility. The COVID-19 virus introduced significant unpredictability and the lessons of COVID-19 will live with us long beyond the virus itself, highlighting the need for multi-sourcing with a diversified supply chain.”

Vinesh Pulse further added, “More recently we have seen further challenges in the supply of semiconductors. Early in the pandemic, we saw Original Equipment Manufacturers (OEMs) and Contract Electronic Manufacturers (CEMs) pausing or reducing production, uncertain of what lay ahead. As the pandemic swept across the globe, the general consensus at the time was of a slowdown in the semiconductor market – but as events have since shown, this opposite was actually happening as “new demands” sucked up already stretched component production capacity. The impact of the universal instruction to “stay at home” led to rapid digitisation driven by the need for high-end products relating to remote working and home entertainment. This in turn, led to an increase in demand for reliable connectivity, adding greater pressure on the need for delivering 5G and its associated infrastructure. Surplus component stock was swept up by manufacturers of high-end products and uncertainty within semiconductor markets was replaced by buoyancy and expansion in demand.”

“There is discussion at very senior levels in governments across the globe to address current semiconductor capacity challenges. There is a need to build a geographically spread supply chain that provides resilience to events such as the pandemic, but also additional supply to address the current demand. Unfortunately building capacity takes time, and current challenges will continue for some time but element14’s policy of investing heavily in stock availability has enabled its customers to mitigate many of these unforeseen issues. element14 has more stock available in its warehouses than ever before, enabling customers to have better access to products. As element14 is a fully authorised and fully franchised distributor, customers can be confident that only genuine manufacturer products are supplied,” concluded by Vinesh.

The distribution market landscape has become very challenging post COVID. DP Sinha, Graphline Computers said, “Currently we see huge demand of laptops in the market but at the same time there is shortage of laptop supply from OEM. This all is because of component shortage especially Intel Processor.”

“TODAY THOMSON SMART TV IS AVAILABLE IN MORE THAN 17000 PIN CODES”

In the past few years, the Indian smart TV market has registered robust growth owing to the increasing demand for entertainment. The rising subscriber base of leading OTT platforms led to an increased demand for smart TVs. Moreover, the high-speed broadband connection has also played a significant role in boosting the growth of smart TV market. Apart from it, Indian households are at the cusp of the transition from traditional TVs sets to smart TVs for a greater viewing experience. This shift is backed by the affordable smart TVs brought by the leading Indian brands who seek to cater to this enormous opportunity across Indian market. Rajeev Ranjan, Editor, Digital Terminal recently talked to Avneet Singh Marwah, CEO, Super Plastronics Pvt. Ltd. (India Brand Licensee, Thomson). Mr. Marwah gave insight about the latest trends in the Indian smart TV market, new evolving technologies and plans to grow in the region. Read below the excerpts:

RAJEEV: WHAT ARE THE LATEST TRENDS IN INDIAN SMART TV MARKET?

MR. MARWAH: We witnessed that the screen time increased as more and more people started working from home due to which there is a pent up demand for larger screens. We also saw a massive jump in the OTT viewership. We have seen almost 70 percent growth on a year-onyear basis and by 2024, I think 95 percent of the market share will be of Smart TVs, with android being one of the topmost operating systems in this category.

RAJEEV: WHAT COULD BE THE NEXT BIG THING IN THE SMART TV SPACE THAT WOULD DRIVE NEW OPPORTUNITIES FOR TV MAKERS?

MR. MARWAH: The next big trend is A.I, which will be your new UI. TV now, will no longer be the large screen at home, but the screen which will be connected to various other smart devices. There are more than 300,000 products or consumer appliances that are already available, ranging from washing machines, refrigerator, smart lights, home safety & security systems and other electric devices, which can be connected to a smart TV. While watching your smart TV, one can access Safety & security alarms, lighting solutions, temperature control, wash settings etc., We feel young and enthusiastic consumer will experiment and adopt to many contactless and AI lead technology solutions in the years to come.

RAJEEV: HOW DID YOU MANAGE BUSINESS CONTINUITY DURING THE 2ND WAVE OF PANDEMIC?

MR. MARWAH: The second wave has been more fatal, it was one of the most challenging job to decide whether to continue operations in this kind of situation. But I’m glad to inform that our front line workers took this decision to continue our manufacturing plant, despite our top management give them alternative day options. That gave lot of strength to your team, in spite of that fear everyone contributed. We got huge support from those states Govt which allowed sales of non-essential goods.

RAJEEV: HOW DO YOU PLAN TO TAKE THE BUSINESS FORWARD FROM HERE?

MR. MARWAH: This is the best opportunity for us to grow in India, as per survey by Local circle there has been decline of 40% of Chinese goods. We have seen that as well, Thomson grew exponentially after the first wave. Therefore we have decide to invest about 150 CR in R&D to develop more technology led smart TV’s. We are expanding our infrastructure to counter at top three online brands in India.

RAJEEV: WHAT ARE THE GROWTH PROSPECTS FOR BRAND THOMSON IN THIS CROWDED AND COMPETITIVE INDIAN MARKET? WHAT IS YOUR GTM STRATEGY FOR UPCOMING MONTHS ESPECIALLY FOR THE FESTIVE QUARTER?

MR. MARWAH: Thomson is seeing a clear pattern of growth and next three years we are expected to grow more than 50% one of the major factor would be the kind of investments we are doing in technology space. We are proud to be one the strategic partners for Google android TV, today we have an advantage to launch same specs android TV with any global brand.

We have a clear GTM strategy that we will be countering any price drop from Chinese brand. We will not let them take that scape of burning money and acquiring market share. Thomson will always remains the best affordable brand for its happy customers. RAJEEV: WHAT ARE YOUR OUTREACH AND EXPANSION PLANS FOR TIER II AND III CITIES? HOW DO YOU PLAN TO REVAMP YOUR DISTRIBUTION SYSTEM?

MR. MARWAH: Today Thomson is available in more than 17000 pin codes, most of our growth is coming from tier 2 and 3. We are targeting lot of new and potential customer’s online customers. We have already started setting up last mile delivery from there cities and towns.

RAJEEV: HOW DO YOU ASSURE TO PROVIDE EXCELLENT SERVICE SUPPORT IN CURRENT SITUATION?

MR. MARWAH: Our insight and experience of selling for the last 30 years helped us understand the market dynamics and study consumer behaviour. Keeping the ongoing situation in mind we offered an honest & fair pricing without trying to burden our customers, Presently we have 3 factories in India, 550 service centres across India, and about 28 warehouses in India. Currently, we are the #2 online selling brand in India.

Vivo Y72 5G

Vivo expanded its 5G portfolio in India with the launch of powerful vivo Y72. The smartphone delivers superior smartphone experience through its robust features while sporting a clearly differentiated design in its category.

OS: Funtouch OS 11.1 (Based on Android 11) RAM: 8GB+4GB Extended RAM Storage: 128GB Display: 6.58” FHD+ Processor: Qualcomm Snapdragon 480 5G Rear Camera: 48MP+2MP Rear Camera Front Camera: 8MP Selfie Camera Battery Capacity: 5000 mAh

The smartphone is priced at INR 20,990. Vivo Y72 will be available in two attractive colour options— Prism Magic and Slate Gray.

OPPO Reno6 Pro 5G

OPPO announced the launch of the most awaited Reno6 Pro 5G smartphone in India. The OPPO smartphone with its other pathbreaking features like 65W SuperVOOC flash charging, Color OS 11.3, the slim design amongst others will empower consumers to experience the best.

OS: ColorOS 11.3 RAM: 12GB Storage: 256GB Display: 6.5” OLED 3D Curved Display Processor: MediaTek Dimensity 1200 Rear Camera: 64MP AI Quad Camera Front Camera: 32MP Selfie Camera Battery Capacity: 4500mAh

The Reno6 Pro 5G is available in 12GB + 256GB (RAM+ROM) priced at INR 39,990.

TECNO CAMON 17 Pro

TECNO has launched CAMON 17 Pro smartphone in India. The introduction of TECNO CAMON 17 Pro will further redefine the mid-range smartphone segment photography and videography capabilities. The smartphone flaunts many segment-first innovations.

OS: HiO7.6 Based on Android 11 RAM: 8GB Storage: 128GB Display: 6.8” FHD+ Display Processor: MediaTek G95 Octa-Core Processor Rear Camera: 64MP AI Quad Rear Camera Front Camera: 48MP Selfie Camera Battery Capacity: 5000 mAh