Wyse targets Indian server mkt

BANGALORE: Wyse Technology, a global player in managed thin clients space announced its entry into the Indian market. According to the company, with this entry all the models of its thin client server based computers, called Winterm, will be available in India through its value added resellers.

"Server centric computing is easily the fourth wave in the computing history. And this wave driven by Java, the increasing use of intranets and a lower cost of ownership has begun rise in importance since 2000," said Wyse Technology Taiwan president YS Fu.

Elaborating on the advantages of thin client computing, the company said that the technology provided increased reliability, faster deployment of software, lower total cost of ownership and better security than client-server architecture. The company also illustrated that thin client shipments are expected to cross the two million figure by 2004 according to IDC.

Wyse’s Winterm models work on four operating platforms — Blazer, Wyse’s proprietary operating platform along with CE, SuSe Linux and HP. Though unwilling to comment on the prices for the Indian market, the company officials said that it would be very similar to the global scale where thin clients are almost 20 percent cheaper than the branded PC market.

Speaking on the company’s plans for India, Fu said, "India is not just a market for us. The talent pool makes it an interesting destination to develop the technology of our products also" He added that some of the operating platforms were being worked on in Noida with almost a 20-member team.

Replying to a question on the Indian market for thin clients, G P Singh of Parrus Technologies, one of Wyse’s partners in the country said, "the Indian market has to go through an education process on thin clients for they have been used to only dumb terminals being sold to them as thin clients. That educating effort will expand the market scope of the country though."

Though the company declined to go into details on the size of the Indian market, it did say that it might be around 10 percent of the PC market even while pointing out that many an enterprise used their existing PCs as thin clients.

(CNS)