Samsung is re-entering the Indian laptop market to compete with Apple and conventional laptop manufacturers such as HP, Dell, and Lenovo. With the help of laptops aimed at students, businesses, and consumers looking for a flagship experience, it hopes to capture a “double-digit” market share by the end of the year.
In the next 2-3 days, the company will unveil six laptops priced between Rs 40,000 and Rs 1,20,000. The Galaxy Book2 Pro 360 will be the flagship model, with the Book2 Pro, Book2, Book2 360, Galaxy Book Go for students, and Galaxy Book 2 Business for businesses rounding out the line.
“Pre pandemic, there used to be one device per family but now it is about one device per member. People bought laptops for school education and work from home but going forward and use cases are growing. The market will be growing…it will be a stable use case,” Sandeep Poswal, general manager and Head of new computing business told ET.
Samsung will also provide student discounts and incentives on all six devices, even though the company will introduce its entry-level Galaxy Book Go laptop exclusively for the segment.
As a result of the ongoing epidemic, there has been a surge in demand for powerful computing devices in an everything-from-home environment, particularly for work, learning, and unwind use cases. As a result, existing PC vendors, as well as new market entrants, are seeing considerable market prospects (including smartphone makers), CMR’s head of industry intelligence, Prabhu Ram, told ET.
According to Tarun Pathak, director of Counterpoint, Samsung has a distinct edge and the capacity to address a major pain point that no other Android or Windows OEM has addressed: phone-to-PC connectivity and continuity.
“The strong market appetite, in both consumer as well as enterprise segments, makes a strong case for Samsung’s re-entry into the laptop market. Samsung has a robust brand equity and a strong channel play in India. This, in turn, should potentially enable the brand to secure early wins and taste success in a rather competitive market,” Ram added.
According to IDC, the conventional PC market in India, which includes desktops, laptops, and workstations, had a great year in 2021, with a shipment increase of 44.5 per cent year over year (YoY).
“Being a vertically integrated player it can ace the specs part easily and can bring in unique features especially leveraging its connected ecosystem (smart things), Spen, quick share, continuity and second screen etc,” Pathak added.
While the notebook category was the volume leader with 11.6 million units shipped, the desktop category, which had had a severe loss in 2020, recovered with a 30 per cent YoY increase. According to IDC’s recent analysis, this is due to robust demand from companies, small businesses, and consumers.
HP maintained its lead in the entire PC market with a 31.5 per cent share, followed by Dell Technologies (23.6 per cent) and Lenovo (18.4 per cent). With an 8.2 per cent market share, Acer Group remained in fourth place, while ASUS remained in fifth place with a 5.9 per cent share.
Smartphone manufacturers have also entered the market in the last 15-18 months to take advantage of the opportunity. For Indian consumers, Xiaomi, Realme, and Honor each brought their unique notebook products.
Poswal said Samsung laptops will be available across online and offline channels in India. “We want to inform consumers about the ecosystem play and our go-to market strategy will revolve around that.”
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