CHENNAI: Digital imaging solution provider Epson India has drawn up a slew of initiatives to double its point of sale (POS) printer business in India by 2009.

The POS printer business currently fetches Epson revenue of Rs. 28 crore, representing 11 per cent of the company's sales in India. The company expects this percentage to go up to 17 per cent by 2009. Epson claims that it has already a market share of 55 per cent for POS printers in India.

N. Samba Moorthy, General Manager (Sales & Marketing) of Epson India said traditional usage patterns and habits still persist. "The market is accustomed to manual billing and is still migrating to a PC with an 80 column Dot Matrix printer billing solutions," he added. The current retail boom presented an opportunity for the company to grow POS printer business. There were too few single-window solution providers in the market, however.

"Today, over 90 per cent of the computerised billing solutions have serious gaps in terms of the software and hardware integration. A tremendous opportunity exists for system integrators who are able to bind all the POS peripherals and extend to the customer a one-stop solution." Epson would focus on identifying such partners and training them to make the products widely available. Epson, a company spokesman said, would invest in expanding the distribution network, training channel partners and system integrators.

A key challenge would be to get end-consumers change their mindsets. "Even today, a switch to computerised billing is more likely to happen as a result of competition with the neighbouring store than by motivation to provide a shopping experience, which will delight the customer," market sources said. Large format stores and more established single outlet retailers have realised the benefit and upgraded.

"The market will really open up once the corner kirana store sees benefit in upgrading to this technology," Mr. Moorthy said.

Printer friendly page  
Send this article to Friends by E-Mail