Tech giant Lenovo to set up 100 exclusive stores in India in FY22

Tech giant Lenovo on Wednesday said it plans to open about 100 Lenovo Exclusive Stores (LES) in FY2022 as part of its efforts to expand its offline retail presence in the country.

The company, which has 400 such stores already across 180 cities, has added about 100 stores in the ongoing financial year. Overall, it has nearly 10,000 offline retail touchpoints for consumers.

In the last one year, every business has got affected, every individual has got affected, either positively or negatively...We opened 100 stores and we plan to open another 100 in FY22, Lenovo India MD and CEO Rahul Agarwal told reporters.

He added that the LES format (which is franchise-owned) currently contributes to about 18-20 per cent of the consumer business revenue and this is expected to grow to almost a quarter.

Asked if any LES was company owned, Agarwal said not yet.

We are studying the new government guidelines for MNCs to sell directly and there is some bit of understanding we need. But right now, everything is franchised, but we are considering opening some flagship stores next year, he said.

Currently, Lenovo has four stores with new premium design in Mumbai, two in Bengaluru, and another in Lucknow. These premium stores are built on the Stay and Play model emphasising improving customer browsing experience in the store with dedicated customer service on a need basis, Agarwal explained.

As part of its Offline to Online (O2O) model, Lenovo enabled customers to complete their purchase on Lenovo.com if the product is not in stock in the stores. Additionally, during the lockdown Lenovo introduced a 100 per cent contactless purchase model.

With the consumer business growing at a rapid pace of 45 per cent year-on-year in Lenovo in FY 2021, it was imperative to continue our offline retail expansion to reach customers to cater to their Learn-From-Home and Work- From-Home needs, Agarwal said.

He added that about 35-38 per cent of Lenovo's revenue in India comes from consumer business, and that the segment is clocking growth rates similar to that of the industry.

Lenovo estimated that approximately 2,000 jobs were generated across India across its 400 LES.

In terms of geographic expansion, Lenovo intends to set up these LES' in key cities across states and also target cities to establish brand presence.

The PC market in India (inclusive of desktops, notebooks, and workstations) grew 9.2 per cent year-over-year growth to 3.4 million units in the July-September 2020 with demand for e-learning and remote working remaining strong, according to research firm IDC.

The consumer segment recorded its biggest quarter-ever with 2 million units shipment, growing 41.7 per cent y-o-y in September 2020 quarter and 167.2 per cent from the previous quarter.

HP led the overall market with 28.2 per cent share, followed by Lenovo (21.7 per cent), Dell Technologies (21.3 per cent), Acer (9.5 per cent) and Asus (7.5 per cent) in the July-September quarter, as per the IDC data.