Printer mkt grows 1.5% in Q1 on govt buying: IDC

Helped by government procurement, the hardcopy peripherals (HCP) market in India grew marginally at 1.5 per cent in January-March 2014 from the previous quarter even as the consumer segment witnessed a slowdown, research firm IDC today said.
As per IDC data, the HCP (inkjet, laser, SDM and line printers) market in India grew 1.5 per cent sequentially in 2014 Q1 to reach 8.01 lakh units in terms of shipments.
However, the numbers do not include A6 format printers.
"The growth was primarily driven by government procurement and supported by medium and large enterprises in India," IDC said.
Government buying in the laser segment recorded a significant sequential growth of 12.8 per cent.

However, the inkjet segment performed weakly due to low consumer demand across all price band segments, resulting in a marginal growth of 1.5 per cent in the HCP market, IDC said.

HP was the leader with 48.3 per cent share of the HCP market, followed by Canon (16.4 per cent), Epson (10.5 per cent), Ricoh (5.7 per cent) and Samsung (5.3 per cent).
Due to low consumer demand and marginally high inventory, inkjet HCP market witnessed a sequential decline of 15.5 per cent in Q1 of 2014.
IDC said all leading vendors in the inkjet HCP market recorded sequential decline but the highest decline was seen in Canon this quarter.

"All the leading vendors had a bit of inventory issues earlier. But later in the second half of the quarter, a lot of new campaigns and marketing activities were seen in the Inkjet HCP market," IDC India Senior Market Analyst Mohit Raizada said.
As a result, a recovery is expected in the next quarter with vendors targeting back to school season, he added.
Laser (printer) HCP market grew 9.3 per cent in terms of unit shipments in Q1 2014 Q1 as compared to Q4 2013, driven by surge in government business and stable channel business.
Laser HCP (Copier-based) market, on the other hand, witnesses very high sequential growth of 68.4 per cent in Q1 2014.

"Printer industry in India is moving to the next level where vendors are mapping and targeting key accounts and industries with the solutions and services approach and are modifying and building their portfolio accordingly," he said.