| The unit, after expansion, will serve as a global supply hub for the company's overseas branches and franchisees. |
| ACI, founded in the UK in 1992, claims to have a nine per cent global market share. It aims to capture over a 30 per cent share by the end of 2005. |
| In April 2004 ACI had launched a notebook at a low price of Rs 29,999. |
| The Gandhinagar plant, with a capacity to manufacture 5,000 notebooks per month, have been set up at an investment of around Rs 3 crore. |
| ACI is in the process of investing about Rs 50 crore to increase the capacity up to 25,000 notebooks per month. The facility at Gandhinagar will also house the service centre for all brands of notebooks. |
| ACI will manufacture seven notebook variants at the Gandhinagar plant with imported original components. |
| "The plant to be commissioned next month is our entry point in India that will enable us to create new source for our overseas markets. We are planning to establish a new unit with a capacity to manufacture 25,000 units per month with an investment of about Rs 50 to 52 crore shortly. Indian manufacturing operations, due to their suitable costing structure, will be beneficial to ACI to continue with our aggressive pricing policy," said Hirji Patel, chairman of ACI plc. and ACI (Asia). |
| ACI is screening possible locations in and around Ahmedabad and Gandhinagar to construct a unit. |
| The company will start exporting notebooks to Sri Lanka, Dubai, South Africa and Australia from India after the completion of its expansion plan. |
| "ACI will have an edge over competitors as the company has experience of over 12 years in the same field. We have suppliers with us with whom we are comfortable in dealing in terms of pricing and response time," said Patel. |
| The company also has plans to float an initial public offering to raise equity around Rs 300 crore. The offer is expected to be registered with the Securities and Exchange Board of India in the first quarter of next fiscal. |
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