Sanyo-BPL in talks with Reliance Retail

Sanyo-BPL, the 50:50 JV between Sanyo and BPL, has initiated talks with the Reliance retail venture. The company, launched early this year, has managed to grab a 4 per cent market share in the colour television segment so far. It is eyeing 7 per cent market share by March 2007. Close to 10 million units of CTVs are expected to be sold during the present fiscal.

Kicking off the festive season's marketing push, Sanyo BPL, president & COO, Keiji Oshima said: "We have already achieved a 4 per cent market share in the CTV segment and expect this to reach the 7 per cent mark during the upcoming festival season. We are presently close to setting up 6,000 outlets in the country and we intend to spread this to 12,000 by the year-end."

The company has also initiated discussions with retail venture of Reliance to be an OEM partner. "Sanyo is the OEM partner for Wal-Mart on a global scale and we have the expertise to be present in this kind of market. We are negotiating various options with Reliance," he added.

Sanyo-BPL is looking at pushing up the volume of Sanyo's home appliances business. "Our dual-brand strategy of promoting BPL and Sanyo brands in the mass and niche segment for the CTVs is working out. Sanyo India will bring in a whole lot of other appliances into India in the near future and we will look at volume sales for this business," he noted.