HP marks its millionth inkjet printer in India

By Anand Parthasarathy

KOCHI, JUNE 21. Hewlett Packard has sold one million inkjet printers in India and to mark the occasion, it launched today a special anniversary edition of a popular model - the photo quality Deskjet 930c.

The U.S.-based IT company, began selling 25 inkjets a month a decade ago, and has remained the dominant player in this budget- end of this PC printer arena, with a current 71 per cent share of the Indian market. Today HP sells over 20,000 units a month, according to Mr. Princy Bhatnagar, market development manager, consumer peripherals.

To celebrate the landmark, HP has released, a special anniversary edition of its Deskjet 930c printer, priced at Rs. 9,999. Distributors can be expected to offer the machine to the end user here, at Rs. 9,000-9,500, since the parent company has offered them a hefty additional discount. The printer is touted as a one- stop photoshop, with 2400-by-1200 dots per inch resolution; a proprietary ``PhotoREt III'' colour layering technology to give photo quality colour and monochrome prints; and free photo finishing and editing software. The company is also throwing in a 17-CD pack of 2.5 lakh royalty-free clip art images.

In recent weeks HP has also slashed prices of its budget inkjets - the 640c and 840c - by around 25 per cent, which has pushed down the actual street prices in the metros to around Rs. 3,500 and Rs. 7,000 respectively.

When colour inkjets crashed the Rs. 5,000 barrier last year, thousands of Indian home users were able to afford a printer with their PC - but soon learnt one harsh fact of life: the purchase price, regardless of manufacturer, soon became a minor element in the total cost of ownership (TCO), because the replenishment price of 3-4 ink refills soon equalled the printer price. Once the free one-year warranty ran out, users also found that third- party annual maintenance contracts were quite costly - Rs. 1,500- Rs. 2,000 for entry models - since the machines, heavy on cost- cutting plastic parts, began suffering numerous faults.

To partly address this grouse, HP today announced that its resellers would offer an additional 2-year warranty over the initial year, for the 600, 800 and 900 series deskjets, at an affordable Rs. 599.

With authorised retailers in 80 Indian towns, HP is aggressively pushing its printer products in the interior heartland - and hopes that its ``giveaway'' 3-year service warranty will in turn give it the edge in a business of volumes and thin margins. However, the cost conscious Indian consumer is still waiting for the one development which will make an inkjet printer really affordable - a drastic reduction in the cost of an original ink cartridge from the current levels of Rs. 1,100-1,500.

Maybe, HP will do that when they sell their 2 millionth PC in India.

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Section  : Business
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