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Apple merges India businesses

Naresh Kumar Thapa, who was appointed managing director of Apple's liaison office operations in India earlier this year, will oversee the operations of the merged entity.

T O D A Y

• Pentamery • More liberalisation • Satyam-GE deal • Apple mergers

Apple has announced a distribution tie-up with Electronic Resources India Limited, the subsidiary of Electronics Resources, Singapore.

ERL is an affiliate of the $16.6-billion Ingram Micro, the largest distributor of information technology products in the world.

"This tie-up for distribution of Apple products in India, the recent tie-up by which Godrej Pacific is marketing the 'iMac' in the consumer market and the fact that Summit Data covers the niche market of desktop publishing, means Apple has covered the country well, in terms of both market segments and geographically,'' claimed Samit Roy, managing director, Apple Computer South Asia.

These tie-ups more than make up for the exit of Wipro Infotech and Odin from reselling Apple machines in the country, Roy said.

The software subsidiary, Apple Development India, was set up in Bangalore in January 1996 to develop software for Apple and its customers. It also has a team working on solutions for the Indian market.

Apple launched the Indian Language Kit, aimed at making the use of computers more widespread by giving people of different linguistic backgrounds an opportunity to use them.

The opening up of the Internet Service Provider policy will be of great advantage when it comes to marketing the 'iMac'. "The 'iMac' is an Internet computer and it will certainly sell well now,'' Thapa said.

He said the 'iMac' also helped Apple get into the market for computers priced below Rs 100,000. Government buying is likely to figure as an important part of the sales of the 'iMac' in India as a result, he said.

Demand generation, entering the consumer market space in a big way and putting the advertising for the 'iMac' in place are the important areas Apple is focusing on in India over the next few months.

- Compiled from the Indian media

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