Asus in talks with Indian EMS players to start local laptop production

Taiwanese laptop maker Asus is in talks with local EMS players to begin local manufacturing of their laptops in the country and aims to capture 20% market share this year in the consumer laptops segment.

“Like other brands / companies, we will have to work with the EMS players to use the PLI scheme. We are working with our EMS to align with the PLI scheme with the government. The talks are already underway. We have no exact timeline, but we want to make it as early as possible,” said Arnold Su, Business Head, Consumer and Gaming PC, System Business Group, ASUS India.

Asus is the number four PC market for consumers in India and grew close to 40% year-on-year in the second quarter. Citing IDC figures, he said the company’s market share in the entire consumer PC was around 9% in Q2 2021.

In the consumer laptops segment, Asus reached 10% market share in Q2 2021. Arnold said Asus is expected to report 30% year-on-year growth for the third quarter. “As far as gaming is concerned, there is expected to be close to 60% growth in Q3 year after year.”

“If we look at the overall market, India is the largest PC market for consumers in the entire Asia-Pacific and also a very important market for Asus. So, this year, we aim to have 20% market share conquest in the segment of laptops for consumers in India, ”said Arnold.

India’s PC penetration rate is still very low at around 10%, he said, adding that the pandemic has driven growth for PCs and laptops. “So, there is a very big opportunity for all PC makers to continue investing in India to do business and meet the peak in demand.

The company is also betting big on the gaming PC market in India with its ROG range. “Sales of PC gaming in India have increased almost 15 times. “This is definitely the most important growth engine for all PC makers and ASUS is pretty strong in the gaming segment,” he said.

In the mainstream laptop segment, Asus is trying to drive growth for the thin and light laptop segment. “Tin and Light drives nearly 70-80% of the non-gaming segment already. It’s the main growth engine for the non-gaming segment and ASUS,” he said.

The company has ZenBook, Vivobook Ultra and Vivobook Pro laptops in the thin and light laptop segment. “… this is the segment with which we want to capture more market share,” he said, adding that the company is also seeing growth for its 2-in-1 products due to various use cases such as.

“Especially after COVID, because of the work of home and study of home scenario, the touchscreen and the use of a stylus to write on your laptop has become a very common scenario for user cases for the laptop users. Until 2019 occupied 2-in -1 but about 5% of the entire PC market, making it a very niche segment.But in the first half of 2021, the segment has already occupied close to 9% of the PC market. in two years, we grew by almost seven times in the 2-in-1 segment, “he added.

Asus’ laptop range is priced between Rs 20,000- Rs 2.9 lakh.

On competition, Arnold said the entry of more players will make the market much larger because the PC penetration level is already very low.

Arnold said Asus is investing in offline retail expansion and is trying to add 20 to 30 exclusive stores each quarter along with another 20-35 store-in-stores bringing the total to 140 store-in-ship stores. “Every quarter we are adding around 300 premium kiosks with ASUS in tier III and tier IV cities. That you can see in a quarter that we are investing close to 400 stores in terms of retail expansion in India,” he added.

Arnold said the offline channel still contributes to about 60% of the PC consumer market of India. “We will continue to invest in our retail expansion. That, at present, we already have almost 150 exclusive stores in India. And by the end of this year, we aim to have about 200 stores in India,” he added.

Asus also has eight ROG (Republic of Gamers) stores in India. “The store expansion is the key for us to grow through, as it still accounts for about 50 to 60% of India’s PC market.” RVPG Media