Taiwan’s Asustek is set to launch its Eee PC range of low-cost laptops in India by January, the company’s head of Indian operations said. The company will sell the cheapest model for Rs 13,000, inclusive of duties. The device, running on a chipset specifically designed for it by Intel and marketed under the Asus brand, has got good response in the US where it was launched in November.
“Initially, we intended to launch it India before the year-end but the product has been sold out. There are no stocks,†says Andrew Tsui, managing director of Asus India. The company claims to have sold 4 lakh Eee PCs in two months since its launch in Taiwan and the target for the next year, the first full year of sales, is 40 lakh units. In the US, the entry-level model sells for $199.
India, where computer usage is still low, is potentially a huge market and the growth has just begun. The Eee PC may offer both affordability and simplicity as its attractions. “You could call it iPod equivalent of the laptop,†says one company official.
“We found most people used their laptops for surfing, e-mail, MSN and Skype,†explains Tsui. Based on these findings, the company built the Eee PC with features that include a LAN card, Wi-Fi connectivity and USB ports but no optical driver. Instead of the traditional memory, the kind that is used in computers, it used flash memory which is used in cell phones. The whole notebook is the size of small diary and weighs less than 1 kg.
It runs on the Linux operating system, Tsui says adding anyone can build applications and games that can then run on the Eee PC. It has a storage capacity of 2 GB or 4 GB. In the US, most sales have been to parents who’re buying it for their five to six-year-old kids as the first computer but in India, the company expects the market for the Eee PC will be significantly different and more of an educational tool.
With the number of Wi-Fi spots in India also being far lesser than in countries such as the US, the company has initiated dialogues with service providers, Reliance Communications and Tata Teleservices, to provide small modems that plug into the Eee PC for wireless connectivity. Source: economictimes
