Monday, June 11, 2001		Newsscape

IBM India, HCL Infosystems and Zenith Computers are all trying to make the most of the current economic slump to expand capacity in India. HCL Infosystems is toying with the idea of setting up another facility in Pondicherry to double the present capacity of 2.5 lakh units in the next 15 months, reports The Hindustan Times. IBM has drawn up an expansion plan for its Pondicherry facility to also reach an annual capacity of 2.5 lakh PCs by the first quarter of next year. Most of these decisions to enhance capacity seem to revolve around the expectations of a spurge in the domestic market in the next one year. According to sources in HCL, "The Internet economy will throw up a demand which will be much greater than the existing 1.7 million PC market size." Zenith has announced its plans to invest Rs 2 crore in increasing their manufacturing capacity two-fold from one lakh to three lakh units this year at its Goa facility. Hewlett-Packard and Compaq, however, have no such plans as of now.

Having pumped in Rs 120 crore in the past three years for technology infusion, the Hong Kong and Shanghai Banking Corporation has plans to launch a suite of mutual funds by October next as well as set up an IT Development Centre by the end of 2001. This will be independent of the bank but under the HSBC Group umbrella. This will be the fourth such centre in the world, the other three being located in Hong Kong, the UK and Canada.

Databazaar India, the Indian arm of Databazaar.com of Florida, is set to introduce printer cartridges and toners for deskjets and laser printers in the Indian market at half the price of those offered by the original printer manufacturers. The company has bought the rights for marketing the printer consumables of Ameriprint in India. Ameriprint sells around 30,000 cartridges and toners per day all over the world. These cartridges are manufactured in the UK and are being shipped to India. The company is planning to introduce the cartridges in India within three weeks. The first products would be launched in Kolkata and Chennai, simultaneously, followed by a launch in Mumbai and then in Delhi. Databazaar India claims that without compromising quality it would be providing printer cartridges and toners that could be 40-50 per cent cheaper. These would be compatible with printers of market leaders like HP, Epson, Canon and others.

Cisco System expects to garner business worth $ 100 million in the Indian market from marketing its next generation Internet routers, launched globally earlier this week, during the next three years. The company is banking on the opening up of international long-distance services for a substantial rise in its revenues from India. However, at present it is focusing on large players like Bharti, Reliance and DSLDishnet, who are expanding the bandwidth availability by landing fibre into the country. Talking to the Hindustan Times, Cisco Systems vice-president, new business ventures (service provider), Jayshree Ullal said, "With continued deregulation, we expect the market to boom in the next 12 to 24 months. International long distance, metro broadband networks, Internet data centres are all expected to fuel the demand for the next generation Internet routers."