KOLKATA: Voltas, a Tata group company has readied a blueprint to recapture the market that it lost to multinational air-conditioner and cooling equipment manufacturers over the last few years.

"Acquisitions, tapping the market in smaller cities, launching sub-Rs. 10,000 room ACs and re-energising channel partners are the basic tenets of this new strategy" according to Voltas Senior Vice-President, K. J. Jawa.

Talking to The Hindu after a press meet here, he said the Rs. 2,000 crore air-conditioning market was ruled by 17 brands, many of which were under one corporate umbrella.

Voltas and Videocon are the only two Indian companies left in the field. Voltas, as part of the group strategy, was open to any acquisition proposal. He declined to divulge further in this regard.

Mr. Jawa said the size of the AC market in cities of over one lakh population had been estimated at 1.2 million pieces now. According to a McKensey study this will increase to three million by 2010. "This is the market that we are targeting, by breaking the price barrier and also expanding our dealer network from 2,000 to 3,500 and by strengthening the franchisee spread," he said.

Admitting that the 50-year-old Voltas had lost its earlier 40 per cent market share to newer entrants, most of whom were multinationals, Mr. Jawa said a 20 per cent share of the market was being targeted (against the present 16 per cent in room ACs) for 2006.

The company, which is also into exports in a major way, will start from June 2006, phased commissioning of its new Rs. 120-crore plant at Pantnagar in Uttaranchal. Its present facilties are located in Hyderabad and Dadra.

Harish Duneja, regional business head, eastern zone, said this region was showing a 50 per cent growth against an industry growth of 22 per cent.

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