PC industry to grow 15 per cent in India: MAIT

NEW DELHI, INDIA: MAIT in its annual industry finding, conducted together with IMRB said that despite inflation, PC sales are up by 16 per cent during FY 2012-13. Servers' sales registered a growth of 3 per cent with a contribution of 90,699 units.

In the Industry Performance Review, the total PC sales between April 2011 and March 2012, with desktop computers, notebooks and netbooks taken together, were 10.8 million units, registering a growth of 16 per cent over the last fiscal.

The sales of desktops stood at 6.7 million units registering a growth of 11per cent. Notebooks recorded a consumption of 3.7 million units, growing 26 per cent over the last year. For the first time in the market, MAIT said, the household desktop market contribution has overtaken the establishment contributing 53 per cent and 47 per cent, respectively.

MAIT president Alok Bhardwaj said that the industry experienced very nervous business environment in 2011-12. “The year has been plagued by many problems like Hard Disk shortage and inflation accompanied with rupee devaluation,” he said.

The market, Bharadwaj said, has actually performed quite well considering the above circumstances and the growth seems to be at a consolidation stage for PC market.

The current economic slowdown is well reflected in the sentiments that we measured for 2012-13, he added. ''The PC industry is expected to grow at 15 per cent to reach 12.4 million units in 2012-13. Some steps in macroeconomic drivers can push the growth to higher levels,'' said Bharadwaj.

Sabyasachi Patra, executive director, MAIT said that PC market growing by 16 per cent and crossing 10 million mark and the internet penetration growing by 15 per cent despite some adversities. ''Considering its multiplier effect on the economy and especially since a major growth is witnessed in the Class II and Class III towns,'' he said.

Patra also strongly urged the government to provide cheaper loans to the common man so that PC and Internet penetration can be further increased and reduce the digital divide.

The annual MAIT Industry Performance Review — ITOPs, conducted by India's leading market research firm IMRB International.  This study involved face-to-face interviews with over 28,000 respondents selected randomly across 35 cities in India.