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ASCI upholds Brother International’s claim of being the No.1 selling fax in USA

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CIOL Bureau
New Update

NEW DELHI August 27 : A recent ruling by the Advertising Standards

Council of India (ASCI) has upheld the complaint of Brother International

against the 'Sharp' range of fax machines for claiming to be 'the No.1 fax

machine in USA."

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The concerned advertisements were released by Electronic Office

Equipment Section of Larsen & Toubro Ltd., the distributor for Sharp

faxes in leading publications. The ad had quoted 1997 sales figure in USA.

This claim of Sharp was challenged by Brother International since as per

the Dataquest USA issue dated February 99, Brother faxes had a market

share of 26.6 per cent against that of Sharp faxes which had a share of

19.7 per cent.

The Consumer Complaints Council (CCC) of ASCI which met on July 1,

1999, upheld Brother International's complaint against Sharp since it

contravened Chapter 1.4 of the code by misleading the general public by

citing earlier market data of 1997 as against the changed current market

situation of 1999. The ASCI has directed Sharp to withdraw/ modify the

offending ad which was misleading the public.

Brother International is a Japanese company headquartered in Nagoya

Japan, with a global consolidated turnover of 3.5 billion US $. Brother is

the undisputed global leader in Office Automation products, which include

fax machines, typewriters, wordprocessors, electronic labeling machines

and Fashion products. In India Brother has a liaison office in Mumbai.

Brother products are currently being marketed in India through a set of

leading distributors that include Godrej Pacific Technology Ltd.

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