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Motherboard Market:With the PC penetration growing and the economy picking up, it is only to be expected that the motherboard market in India is buoyant and moving ahead with reasonable growth prospects.

Buoyant & Moving aheadThe world is moving at a very fast rate and

there are very large numbers of technologies coming up with each passing day. The scenario in India is however different. The rate of growth of technology is not as fast as that of the US or Japan or many other countries. As a result of this, the Indian consumer market has to rely on imports for the lasts in technology. The irony in this is that the people or rather the consumers have to wait in order to get their hands on quality technology or gadgets or the latest electronic goods. Since the motherboard industry is mature, the cost/performance ratio of the product and speed of technology adoption are going to be the final keys to success. As the desktop total available market growth rate is shrinking, only those motherboard manufacturers

who occupy leading brand positions will survive. Innovation and product quality are both key to brand image. However, both need long-term resource investment. The continuing drop of profit margins isn’t necessarily bad. This is a positive move, because manufacturers now have the know-how to keep the same functionality by removing unnecessary components. This will start with motherboard manufacturers and end with the consumers. Lower production cost means lower MSRP. Everyone is a winner.

Over the past decade, the motherboard industry has gone through a few rough patches. The economic recessions over the past few years really show in the number of players left in the game. And if the current economic climate has anything to say about it, it is possible that

this is not the end of the list. It is important to point out that some of these brands are not the result of dead companies. Some have just simply exited from the channel motherboard business.

The players that remain are still facing the simple challenge of relevancy. Part of the reason for the previously-large number of motherboard makers was decent profit margins. As margins dropped, fewer players could financially afford to stay in the industry. Now that the industry is basically mature, how do these makers continue to separate themselves from the pack?

Over the next few years, there will see continuing pressures on price as manufacturers weather the changing economic climate. However, this has not abated the consumer thirst for well-designed products. It seems to

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us that manufacturers will need to focus on delivering better feature sets with an eye on time-to-market. For example, one or two brands are in a vulnerable state because their products were released more than a month behind the rest of the pack. A high-price feature-laden motherboard can justify an early entry as much as a low-price barebones design can justify a late entry. However, motherboard manufactures will find this is going to be a careful balancing act. In fact, winning is about doing both.

The market share numbers for everyone are in flux, but keep in mind that this is not really due to a major decline in unit sales. Over the past few years, everyone was hit fairly proportionately by the economic downturns. If you look at the numbers, the total available motherboard market is experiencing slow growth, but is not shrinking. This is an important distinction to make. The shifting numbers are not a result of giving up market share; it is more a result of a company taking a share of the growing market disproportionate to its current market share. So this makes for a major shift in the market share landscape, even though the total market and individual companies both may see some degree of growth.Market Trend

Now, the motherboard industry looks vastly different than it did in 2005; there are several players on the scene, all of which have wised up to a more dynamic market. “India is a very important market due to the scale and size of demand like most emerging markets. The growth in PC sales echoes in the motherboard industry. With PC usage going beyond standard office productivity and internet surfing to movies, music and games, the market has opened up to mid and hi-end PCs which require lot of features like USB 3.0, HDMI, Graphics etc. This provides

lot of opportunities for motherboard vendors to sel l a complete range of boards ,” sa id , Raghuraman P a t t a b i r a m a n , Director - Transaction Business, AMD India.

“Desktop board is slowing in mature markets but is still growing in emerging markets like India. Part of it is due to notebooks, netbooks and tablet transitions. India still sees PC as a shared utility in homes and hence DT and MBs are having traction. We are also seeing increasing acceptance of AIO form factors which will continue to need smaller form factor MBs,” said, R . Rav i chandran , D i r e c t o r - S a l e s , In te l South As ia .

“ I n I n d i a , the market s ize is approximately three million for motherboards excluding OEM and branded PCs. As predicted for every year, growth in C, D and E-class cities have been strong and the potential of smaller cities is being felt. Demand for mid- and high-end motherboards has been consistently improving in the last six months in C, D and E-class cities. There is a great demand for robust,

feature-rich and quality products and buyers are also becoming more knowledgeable a b o u t w h y t h e y a re buy ing those products, which is a good sign for market evolution,” said, Eric Kuo, MD, MSI India

“Desktop market is shrinking globally due to popularization of net books and t a b l e t s . A n d i n growing economies motherboard market is growing at single d i g i t o n l y . B u t India still maintains stable growth for motherboards market d u e t o d e m a n d f r o m e d u c a t i o n , governmental and m e d i c a l s e c t o r . T o t a l m a r k e t o f motherboard in India i s over 3 mi l l ion per year excluding O E M , ” o p i n e d ,

James Lee , Sa les Direc tor ASROCK.Amod Phadke, Director - Sales & Marketing,

VIA Technologies, Inc. said, “The motherboard market is highly competitive globally as well as, of course, in India. The main areas of growth are in emerging markets such as China, Latin America, India, the Middle East, and Africa. These are the key regions we are focusing on, and we have an excellent partnership with Simmtronics under which we are working to further strengthen our presence in the India, Middle East, and African markets.”

“Motherboards market is increasing steadily. The market is for New Pc’s and replacement market. The market is growing at 15% per annum. Simmtronics is manufacturing the entire range of motherboards in India at their facility in Roorkee. The motherboards range start from Lower end to high end for Intel. AMD, VIA. Simmtronics is the exclusive manufacturer for VIA motherboards for 11 countries. Simmtronics is exporting its product range all over the globe,” said, Inderjit Sabharwal MD of Simmtronics Semiconductor.

“ We are seeing growth in motherboard market globally, it’s growing because the desktop is still preferred in home and education segment, infact, the popularity of tablet PC is affecting the notebooks and netbooks in the market due to it mobility, so it is encouraging consumers to option for a tablet pc instead of a notebook and in pair to have a desktop at home for entertainment and education, as per Taiwan industry estimation; global desktop shipments are likely to gain 7~8% in the year which is higher than 3~4% predicted earlier. India economy is on a swing, it is a huge and growing domestic market, no doubt the motherboard market in India will grow at a reasonable pace and will move ahead,” said, SIMON WU – BIOSTAR

Mr. Raghuraman Pattabiraman, Director - Transaction Business, AMD India“AMD is working actively to make CPUs that are high on performance and low on energy consumption. APU technology from AMD is more energy efficient than previous generations. Not only are our new products energy efficient but, according to the SMART 2020 study, is applying digital technology to increase energy efficiency. This is estimated to have the potential of reducing 15% of the world's total greenhouse gas emissions by 2020. ”

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Mr. R. Ravichandran, Director-Sales, Intel South Asia“It is true that some markets are very price sensitive, but there are also buyers who are very focused on brand, quality and post sales warranty/support. Intel Desktop brand is considered as tier 1 and there are less than a handful of motherboard suppliers in that space. We are very focused on meeting and exceeding specifications, time to market to enable customers with latest technology. From a product stand point, we engineer it with great design, follow it up with high quality components, and complement them with more than 5000 hours of test and validation.”

GROUP IMEA MB SALES DIRECTOR.“Globally the motherboard market is

shrinking as developed economies already have large penetration of PC, but for India where still the average PC penetration <25 per 1000, we have immense potential. Recent projection by MAIT survey show total desktop for 2011-12 to be >7.7M with local OEM & assemblers contributing <50%>, this is huge opportunity for new vendors like us,” said, Rajan Sharma, AVP – Sales, DIGILITE.

According to Sushmita Das, Country Manager, Kobian India, the motherboard market has matured over the years and the positive signal in the market is the filtration of the various unstructured players who were making the business volatile and unpredictive. Currently the market has stabilized with a few brands wherein the consumers are also confident of the brand and their consistency in the market.

“This is not only in India but globally, Mercury being a global Motherboard brand sees a lot of stability in the channel market in UAE, Africa in addition to the SAARC region,” she added further.

“ The Motherboard market growth is flat or very small growth, of course the reason is that consumer shifting from conventional PC to Notebook but still the growth in some regions like brazil, Russia, India, China and few more countries are quite good as the PC penetration rate is quite good due to stable growing economy. Also Motherboard market differentiate with the product segmentation, like in India, still entry level market is more than 80% while similar other country like Russia

have more % on mid & high-end m o t h e r b o a r d . Looking at India, the a t tach ra t io per person PC is still below 10% so there is still a huge market available in future hence the motherboard market would be good in India and I would say parallel, the demand will also increase f o r m i d , h i g h -end and industrial motherboards for different industries,” said, Deepak Gupta, Country Manager, Z o t a c I n d i a .

“ F o r t h e current scenar io of Motherboard market in India, the total motherboard market available size is 4.42 million which includes local brand a n d D I Y c l o n e market (resource

from Gartner,2011). ECS has confidence to reach 0.55million in 2011, which means 12% market share of MB penetration in India. ECS is currently ranked 3 in shipment quantity of motherboard in India. However, ECS continues to develop OEM, ODM and channel b rand bus ines s in India. ECS is heading goal of ranked top 2 in 2012,” said, Ken Cheng, Director. Pan India Sales D e p t . S a l e s & Marketing Division, Channel Business Unit, Elitegroup C o m p u t e r Systems Co., Ltd.

“Motherboards a r e a g r o w i n g market in India as it is one of the few countries where the desktop segment is st i l l growing. The growth for overall TAM for m o t h e r b o a r d s is at about 11% annually and ASUS is the leader in this segment with 37% market share. Unit wise, the TAM is

at 3 million motherboards annually,” said Vinay Shetty Country Head, ASUS (India).

“Global DT market is facing a growth of 9% in 2011. Interesting scenario is, no: of players are coming down bucketing Tier #1 brands with major market share. And, in 2012, it is expected to be 5% growth, India market will see the volume will be 6.5 Million in 2011, with a growth of 9%,” concluded Siril Muthirakkal, Sales Manager, Foxconn Middle East-India-Africa. Technology trend

Now the industry has always been on a smaller, faster, cheaper trend, and that's never going to change. For the immediate future, it isn’t so much “faster” as it is “fast enough.

“We would like to answer this question in two fold. For region specific like south Asia, we have implemented EOS protection diodes on ports that might experience high voltage back drive. We have implemented OSP to ensure lessening corrosion due to high humidity. we have implemented fault tolerant BIOS to deal with corruption due to regular power loss. We are also launching India hardening skus with power supervisor to prevent PC damage due to power loss and power spikes. For the user experience and performance front, we have launched skus with fast boot, RST caching, Wi-Fi mSATA SSD connectivity to name a few. We will also launch skus with Thunderbolt and graphical BIOS interface and we will implement all features that offer by Intel CSET capability,” said, Ravichandran of Intel.

“We are a lways among f irst 3 in implementing new chipsets. Also, in the MB based solutions, we have aggressively come

Mr. Amod Phadke, Director - Sales & Marketing,VIA Technologies, Inc.“We already have a very strong presence in China and Latin America and, as mentioned above, are working very closely with Simmtronics to expand our share in India, SAARC, the Middle East, and Africa. India is still a relatively small market compared to China, so we believe there continues to be huge room for growth, particularly for low cost energy PCs. We also believe that there is great potential in other parts of the region. ”

Mr. Vinay Shetty, Country Manager, ASUS India“ASUS has been at the forefront of this trend with our Republic of Gamers or ROG brand established in 2006. Today ROG is synonymous with overclocking and gaming in the hardware world. We’ve been having gaming events, overclocking events and recently concluded a very successful power user meet which was a first of its kind event in India. In this meet we invited and educated top power users from India about overclocking and our various product developments and sought their feedback on our products and offerings. Enthusiast segment is where maximum innovation happens in terms of product development and as such this segment is of prime importance to us. We’re also working on our own ROG certified gaming cafes that feature our hardware and provide gamers in the country with a very unique gaming experience.”

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out with BB solutions which can nullify the testing criteria of SMBs. This is full system excluding CPU, HDD & memory. Moreover, we have DT solutions based on atom and cedar view, which is getting huge demand from market,” said Siril of Foxconn.

“We have a very strong focus on R&D and continuously come out with innovative technologies to give the best value for money for our customers. Very recently, we launched the Ultra Durable 4 Classic motherboard technology that safe-guard PCs from common everyday threats, including humidity and moisture, electro-static discharge, sudden power loss and high operating temperatures. The motherboards in the series appropriately suit the Indian consumer requirements,” said, Sunil Grewal, Sales Head - India, GIGABYTE Technology India Pvt. Ltd.

“Innovation with style” has been our motto and we have strengthened it further to give the best in performance, sound & vision. MSI has come up with new features in our motherboard categories such as OC Genie, Military Class, Big-Bang series for hard-core gamers. MSI adopts server grade components which provide an extra long life span, more stability and higher quality of its products. In our new launched Z68 chipset, MSI provide world’s first PCI express Gen3 technology, with ultra-high 32GB/s transfer bandwidth. PCI Express Gen 3 provides 2 times faster transfer rate than the previous generation. This delivers amazing capabilities for true next generation extreme gaming,” said, Eric Kuo of MSI India.

“At MSI, we are forever striving towards the

next innovative step. A visionary business division that invests considerable sums of money is the driving force behind MSI’s unstoppable R&D. Our average R&D costs, which are to the tune of 2.23%, surpass those of our competitors and our Industrial Design Center focuses on developing products scheduled to hit the market over the next three to five years. Essentially, we have concept products c h a r a c t e r i z e d b y o u t s t a n d i n g achievements in R&D.MSI believes in bringing out the l a tes t and most updated technology to our partners . “Innovation with s ty le” has been our motto and we have strengthened

it further to give the best in performance, s o u n d & v i s i o n , ” a d d e d , K u o .

“ASUS strength lies in superior product design, technological innovation and product quality. The build quality of our products has always been of the highest level and we i n c o r p o r a t e various unique features in our p r o d u c t s t o give them an edge over our compet i t ion . A S U S motherboards have var ious u n i q u e innovations like Dual Intelligent Processors 2 wi th DIGI+ V R M - consisting of t h e E n e r g y P r o c e s s i n g U n i t ( E P U ) and TurboV P r o c e s s i n g Un i t (TPU) , t h i s u n i q u e t e c h n o l o g y delivers a potent combina t ion of streamlined

system-wide energy consumption and enhanced PC performance. Second-generation Dual Intelligent Processors 2 technology adds the innovative DIGI+ VRM design to set a new standard in digital power management. DIGI+ VRM replaces analog voltage regulator module (VRM) controllers with a digital programmable microprocessor that fully integrates Intel’s VRD 12 CPU power delivery system to eliminate digital-analog conversion. Since it works at such a fundamental level, DIGI+ VRM improves PC performance from the ground up, improving overclocking capabilities while increasing power efficiency, system stability and reliability,” said, Shetty of ASUS.

“Technology changes almost daily. ECS knows innovative technologies create value in products. For example, ECS "Black Series" is high-end motherboards which both implemented in Intel and AMD platform. ECS is capable to differentiate itself from other brand by different exclusive features. Like, 333-Ensure the Faster, Stable and Long-lasting Performance; ECS QoolTech IV - ECS Exclusive Thermochromic Technology; ECS GUI UEFI BIOS; 3X Current Supply for ECS EZ Charger; Software utilities : eBLU/eDLU/eSF; Motherboard Intelligent BIOS X (M.I.B X - Ultimate BIOS O.C interface),etc.” said, Ken of ECS.

“In motherboards most of the features are driven by chipset vendors. We are focusing on the lower price segment where customer is looking for best product at right price. We have most of the key chipset based boards in AMD, VIA and Intel. We are exclusive Manufacturers & suppliers of VIA Motherboards for 11

Mr. James Lee, Sales Director, AsRock“As the world top 3 motherboard manufacturer, ASRock aims to offer high-performance and best quality products to PC enthusiasts. For Intel segment, ASRock brings the remarkable PCI-E 3.0 characteristics in its current Z68 and P67 motherboard series. We’re prioritizing the much-anticipated X79 platform implementation and keen on being the first to produce the most sophisticated X79 motherboard. ASRock has always been a leader in every evolutionary cycle. The latest AMD 9 Series Motherboard is the most powerful AM3+ appliance on the market that can support AMD’s revolutionary Fusion technology and Nvidia SLI technology.”

Mr. Simon Wu, Biostar Group IMeA MB Sales Director“Motherboard is no more JUST A COMPONENT in a PC, we are planning new technology base on three “E”s which are Extreme Performance, Entertainment Life Style and Elegant Product Style, i.e. Easy Overclocking softwares, Bio-Remote which allows user to control their home PC through Biostar remote controller or through their smart phone…etc., base on three “E”s concept, we are developing various new technology which we hope to surprise Biostar supporters in the near time.”

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countries. We offer Global warranty of 3 years on all our Motherboards like Return to bench warranty on all our Motherboards,” said, Sabharwal of Simmtronics India.

“ There are a lot of new technology are in line to introduce in all new series motherboards for example mSATA, EUFI bios, Display-port etc. and as I said previous question – differentiation is the only to tackle the competition, we have a big line up in Mini-ITX form factor motherboard with dual Wi-Fi and future board will come with Bluetooth as well and no other brand offering such products to the market, “ZOTAC Mini-ITX motherboards are very much capable to compete with other brand’s ATX or high-end boards”. Also mini-ITX boards are well appreciated by different industries as a industrial board, for example – Digital Signage, hospitality etc,” said, Gupta of Zotac.

Sushmita Das of Kobian India opined, “New boards launched are designed for the 2nd generation Intel Core i7 processors, Intel Core i5 processors, and other Intel processors in the LGA1155 package. These are powered with DVI-D and VGA connectors and supports dual independent display for processors with Intel HD Graphics. Powered by the 2nd generation Intel Core processor family, the new series of motherboards delivers a superb visual performance for sharper images, richer color, and lifelike audio and video. The next launch is for the LGA1366 package boards for the Corei7 processors which are powered with 6x Tri channel DDR3 memory at a QPI bus speed of 6.4GT/s. The ATI CrossfireX technology brings incredible gaming experience for gamers. Boards are now equipped with better efficient features like SATAII ports equipped with Intel Matrix Technology and Raid 0,0+1 &5 and further compatibility with e-SATA offers higher storage capabilities.”

“We are already in the forefront to scale up new

2nd generation core –I platform with our latest products. Also in AMD segment we a r e o f f e r ing channel excellent products with mind blowing graphics advantages in A6 series & even in entry level 760G series,” c la imed, Sharma of Digilite India.

W u o f Biostar explained, “Motherboard is no more JUST A COMPONENT in a PC, we are planning new t e chno logy base on three “E”s which are Extreme P e r f o r m a n c e , Entertainment Life Style and Elegant Product Style, i.e. Easy Overclocking

softwares, Bio-Remote which allows user to control their home PC through Biostar remote controller or through their smart phone…etc., base on three “E”s concept, we are developing various new technology which we hope to surprise Biostar supporters in the near time.”

“We are soon going to be rolling out both dual core and quad core motherboards into the market. In addition to providing excellent multitasking and multimedia performance, they are very low power. Indeed our new VIA QuadCore processor is the lowest power four core processor in the market. We will also shortly be introducing support for DDR3 memory as well as more advanced 3 D a n d H D video rendering technologies ,” Phadke of VIA Techno log ies .

“ A S R o c k i s t h e f i r s t m o t h e r b o a r d c o m p a n y i n t h e w o r l d t o l a u n c h G e n 3 motherboards in Z68 Chipset supporting PCI 3 .0 S lo t s and XMP 1.3. ASrock strong RD team a l w a y s k e e p s them ahead of its

competitors and come out with latest of products with best available features in market. We design products as per demand and need of market. Very soon we will be coming up with X79 chipset of motherboards,” said, Lee of ASROCK.

“AMD has launched the third PC era in India – the APU Era. AMD Fusion Accelerated Processing Units (APU) for motherboards. The APU provides big experiences, sleek designs, all-day battery life and notebooks that stay cool with a revolutionary single chip. This also includes outstanding graphics performance, exceptional compute capability at unexpectedly low price points. An explosion in multimedia requires new applications and new ways to manage and manipulate the data and AMD is catering to these demands by consumers with ease. To run the complete range of APUs, AMD has launched the FM1 infrastructure based chipsets, the A-55 and A-75, which offer features such as DDR3-1866, USB 3.0, SATA-6 etc. These boards are available from all the top motherboard vendors like Asus, Gigabyte, Digisol, MSI, ECS etc,” concluded, Raghuraman of AMD India.Vendor’s Strategy in the race

“Since, India is an important market for MSI; we are continuously working towards making our marketing strategy more aggressive and effective. The only way, one can maintain our top position with changing technology is by pre-empting future needs and innovating accordingly, with MSI’s strength in Research and development,” said, Kuo of MSI India.

“It is true that some markets are very price sensitive, but there are also buyers who are very focused on brand, quality and post sales warranty/support. Intel Desktop brand

Mr. Rajan Sharma, AVP – Sales, DIGILITe“ As our product is made in India & made for India, we do not see much competition happening, we are offering channel & customers product suited to our conditions & ensuring value/performance proposition to ensure lower TCO in long term.”

Ms. Sushmita Das, Country Manager, Kobian India“Cut throat competition is a perception !! In a technology market the product sells on its features, specifications and after sales support. As mentioned earlier there has been various brands who have brought down the ASP of the motherboards . Unfortunately some named brands get into the price competition and cut costs in their quality and thus create the so-called ‘cut throat competition’ where distributors , dealers and resellers are fighting for mere Rs 20-30/per board.”

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is considered as tier 1 and there are less than a handful of motherboard suppliers in that space. We are very focused on meeting and exceeding specifications, time to market to enable customers with latest technology. From a product stand point, we engineer it with great design, follow it up with high quality components, and complement them with more than 5000 hours of test and validation,” said, Ravichandran of Intel.

“GIGABYTE is uniquely positioned, with its wide range of premium-featured motherboards, to meet the growing customer demand for the right Price / Performance ratio. This is complemented by a three-pronged strategy for the Indian market. Firstly, product Innovation has been always a major focus area for GIGABYTE, and since 2006 the company has been setting and patenting multiple quality standards every year, such as 24 Phase Power VRM, 2oz Copper PCB, Dynamic Phase Power Switching Energy Saving Technology, All Solid Capacitor, and TouchBIOS, to name a few,” said, Sunil Grewal of GIGABYTE Technology India Pvt. Ltd.

“After-Sales Service is another focus area. We have in 2011 opened GIGABYTE Exclusive Service Centers in six major cities, which also act as hub for the Pan-India market. We also have appointed over 40 Premier Partners as Special Service Partners (SSPs) that basically are collection points. We are increasing the number of SSPs across the country. We have over 80 collection points in over 80 cities, and intend to spread our service support / collection point network to over 100 cities.We also are focused on creating an ‘IT knowledge Community’ through regular

System Integrator (SI ) and co l lege events. This is an ongoing process for GIGABYTE which has a commitment to conduct over 25 SI meets and ove r 10 co l l ege events per quarter,” a d d e d , G r e w a l .

“ W e l o o k a t competit ion in a very healthy way, and carry a very positive frame of mind and respond to i t by giving many value added features to our valued customers. W e h a v e m a n y exclusive features like XFast USB, XFast LAN, OC DNA and Instant boot adding to all ASRock motherboards which are very useful in daily use for storing or transferring data to and from Pen drive by increasing transfer speed by 400% and

enhancing internet speed for better surfing, over clocking features by interface available to all users and fastest boot with in 4 secs of time. Service is the backbone of brand image and we always work hard and try to give best of after sales service, we continuously work on giving fastest and best of services to all end users and answers to each and every query and their feedback so that they not only get the best quality, features, p r i c e f o r t h e product but also the best of services,” s a i d , M a n o j Kr ip lan i , Sa les Head at AsRock.

“ C u t - t h r o a t compet i t i on i s m o r e a t e n t r y level. AMD offers complete range of CPUs & APU which give vivid digital and visual experience to users. To bring varying levels of experience

to users AMD offers a wide range of chipsets across the spectrum. This is unmatched my competition. To run the complete range of AMD Semprons, Athnons & Phenoms, AMD offers AM3 infrastructure based chipsets which are: 760G chipset at entry level followed by 880G for mainstream and 890GX for top performance. For customers wanting future proof and ultimate performance they can get the AM3+ based 9XX series chipset motherboards. These offer PCI express, overclocking, Dierct X11 and more. These are 970 at entry level, 990X at mainstream and 990FX at hi-end. Best part is they are even compatible with the bulldozer CPUs which AMD is launching in Q4 of this year,” said, Raghuraman of AMD India.

“Competition drives innovation and is great for the consumer. For many years we have held a leadership position in the fast growing energy-efficient small form factor motherboard segment targeted at Green PC systems and will continue to build on this by delivering the lowest power motherboards to the market,” said, Phadke of VIA Technologies.

“Our 95% of our motherboard business is channel business, so we understand the kind of needs is required by the channels, as demanded by our channel partners six years ago, we start our development on the high-end motherboards, high-end motherboards doesn't mean expensive, we are making the high-end motherboards with the best performance / cost ratio, and only in a short spin of 6 years, Biostar motherboard brand is renowned as the "OVERCLOCKING KING". We always appreciate the competitions in the market, because through our competitions, it will allow Biostar to improve and to grow. Regarding

Ken Cheng, Director. Pan India Sales Dept.Sales & Marketing Division, Channel Business Unit, elitegroup Computer Systems Co., Ltd.“ECS provides better service, innovation and customization products, higher product quality and more marketing exposure to India market. For example, due to dry environment in India and also most of country, ECS motherboards are built-in the ESD protection design with ESD components. Therefore, ECS motherboards are safer than ever from now on. On the other hand, ECS continues marketing exposure and invests more resources to expand brand image in India. Product stability is the key to stand in the market for a long term.”

Mr. Deepak Gupta, Country Manager-India - Zotac“The Motherboard market growth is flat or very small growth, of course the reason is that consumer shifting from conventional PC to Notebook but still the growth in some regions like brazil, Russia, India, China and few more countries are quite good as the PC penetration rate is quite good due to stable growing economy. Also Motherboard market differentiate with the product segmentation, like in India, still entry level market is more than 80% while similar other country like Russia have more % on mid & high-end motherboard. Looking at India, the attach ratio per person PC is still below 10% so there is still a huge market available in future hence the motherboard market would be good in India and I would say parallel, the demand will also increase for mid, high-end and industrial motherboards for different industries.”

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Mr. Indrajit Sabharwal, MD Simmtronics Semiconductors LTD“The global technology market is witnessing a growing race among manufacturers to introduce the lowest carbon emission and most environmentally friendly products in order to enable their customers to become a part of a healthy and green society tomorrow. Simmtronics is taking aggressive steps to accelerate this trend .This year we have launched VIA product with GO GREEN campaign and covered 20 cities show.”

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our position, Biostar stand as the TOP3 MB Global brand, this is an award from the Taiwan Foreign Trading Affairs,” said, Simon Wu of Biostar.

“As our product is made in India & made for India, we do not see much competition happening we are offering channel & customers product suited to our conditions & ensuring value/performance proposition to ensure lower TCO in long term. We choke out different strategies for our product. Like, price position close to market leaders but with additional features to ensure PRICE /PERFORMANCE value add which helps reduce TCO in long term. Strong channel base of National Distributors/Regional Distributors across India with INGRAM MICRO as distribution partner, 34 re-distribution partners. Legacy of sales, marketing & service experience of Joint Ventures. Continued & sustained channel promotion to ensure assured ROI to channel in terms of profitability, ROCE for distributors. SI/OEM benefit with long term savings on ‘working capital’ employed. Our own service network with confirmed 3BD/7BD TAT, committed ‘BURNT WARRANTY’, ‘3 –YEARS CARRY IN’, 66 own locations,” said, Sharma of Digilite.

“Cut throat competition is a perception!! In a technology market the product sells on its features, specifications and after sales support. As mentioned earlier there has been various brands who have brought down the ASP of the motherboards. Unfortunately some named brands get into the price competition and cut costs in their quality and thus create the so-called ‘cut

throat competition’ where distributors , dealers and resellers a r e f i g h t i n g f o r m e r e R s 2 0 - 3 0 /per board. Mercury has maintained its stand by keeping a consistency in the product quality and service support. We are one of the oldest Motherboards brands in the country. There has been a consistency in the supply, support and promot iona l activities of Mercury motherboards. This h a s b e co m e o u r competitive edge in the market wherein partners are aware of the sincerity of the organization and the commitment of the brand to the market. Mercury enjoys a handsome set of loyal MercPartners who have supported and been a catalyst in the growth and position of Mercury in the country,” said, Das of Kobian India.

“In a current situation every industry have cutthroat competition and being we are the late

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Mr. Sunil Grewal, Sales Head - India, GIGABYTe Technology India Pvt. Ltd.“We have been organizing various meets to reach out to SIs in these regions and to educate them how GIGABYTE motherboards can be used to grow their business. We have also been strengthening our post-sales service for our growing channel base. In the process, we have been increasing the number of Value Partners in the Tier 2 and 3 regions, and today, have over 2,500 Value Partners across India.”

Mr. eric Kuo, Managing Director, MSI India“At MSI, we are forever striving towards the next innovative step. A visionary business division that invests considerable sums of money is the driving force behind MSI’s unstoppable R&D. Our average R&D costs, which are to the tune of 2.23%, surpass those of our competitors and our Industrial Design Center focuses on developing products scheduled to hit the market over the next three to five years. Essentially, we have concept products characterized by outstanding achievements in R&D.”

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entrant we will have dipper competition but we are taking competition as opportunity to perform, we are quite positive to see good result as we have very strong company back-up, we are capable to deliver the right product (India oriented) with right price and quick time (due to huge factory, good R & D Team and a good distribution network – Neoteric). Our plan to reach in Top 3 Motherboard place with in 2014. As far as competition is concern – Only differentiation of the product is the way to tackle the competition, some of our products are absolutely different and no other Motherboard brand have such kind of product, for example – ZOTAC Z68ITX-Wi-Fi Supreme – this is with Intel Z68 chipset along with NVIDIA GT430 1G DDR3 graphics on board. So our strategy is quite clear to differentiate the product with quick after sales support and a good channel network,” said, Gupta of Zotac India.

“ECS is ranked in top three brands for India market currently. Most people think ECS only provides the best price-performance ratio motherboards. However, ECS is now dedicated in product research and development to enhance brand image towards higher brand position. ECS is heading goal of ranked top 2 in 2012. ECS provides better service, innovation and customization products, higher product quality and more marketing exposure to India market. For example, due to dry environment in India and also most of country, ECS motherboards are built-in the ESD protection design with ESD components. Therefore, ECS motherboards are safer than ever from now on. On the other hand, ECS continues marketing exposure and invests more resources to expand brand image in India. Product stability is the key to stand in the market for a long term,” said, Ken of ECS.

“Competi t ion is always good for the market if it is healthy as it brings out the best from all vendors and provides the best products for the consumers to choose from. The motherboard segment is fiercely compet i t ive and there is constant i n n o v a t i o n a n d product development required to stay at the top of the game. We are currently positioned as the market leader in India as wel l as globally and have a 37% market share in India. We always focus on providing our customers with the best price to performance ratio. Constant innovation, reducing time to

market and unmatched service support are some of the focus points for us in establishing our motherboard business. We have also been fortunate to have continuous support from our loyal channel partners who have been doing business with us for a long time and representing us at the last mile. They are a part of our ASUS extended family and t h e i r s u p p o r t and feedback has been crucia l to our success,” said Shetty of ASUS.

“India is such a market where people look for value for money rather than the cheaper product. One can reach in commendable p o s i t i o n b y f o c u s s i n g i n Quality, Service and implementing partner-fr iendly s t r a t e g i e s . Currently, Foxconn is positioned at TOP 4 among Tier #1 brands. The major schema is to focus on healthy ROI than to be top on the ranking. And, you need to be careful when spending as DT

growth is not as high as mobile solutions. So, conservativeness pays here. We have seen many players vanished in the recent past due to short-term strategies. In short, motherboard solutions needs simple business logic and care where you can get bigger share of the cake, securing the financials at the same time. Foxconn has healthy financial back up and proper system & will remain the TOP3 in the MB industry down the line for 5 years,” said, Siril of Foxconn.

“Simmtronics are the only manufacturer of Motherboards in India and we Provide Global Warranty to our customers, RMA support for three years. Simmtronics manufacturers the totals range of Intel, AMD & VIA motherboards. We have recently launched Intel based H-61, & VIA VX900I. We manufacture these motherboards at Simmtronics Roorkee Plant in India which is a state of the art manufacturing facility. The motherboard uses all high quality components and is tested in-depth at Simmtronics quality standards. This plant is one of the largest motherboard plants in India,” said, Sabharwal of Simmtronics India.

“Simmtronics Motherboards are manufactured at Simmtronics Roorkee Plant in India which is a state of the art manufacturing facility. The motherboard uses all high quality components and is tested in-depth at Simmtronics quality standards. High speed SMT lines are used for production and has a capacity for 100K motherboards per month,” concluded, Sabharwal.Upward Trend

India is a highly diverse nation and India is thriving to be one of technology enabled country, where new technology, inception and mass adaption is always in close proximity. MSI provides with new technology to its customers

Manoj Kriplani, India Sales Head, ASROCK“We look at competition in a very healthy way, and carry a very positive frame of mind and respond to it by giving many value added features to our valued customers. We have many exclusive features like XFast USB, XFast LAN, OC DNA and Instant boot adding to all ASRock motherboards which are very useful in daily use for storing or transferring data to and from Pen drive by increasing transfer speed by 400% and enhancing internet speed for better surfing, over clocking features by interface available to all users and fastest boot with in 4 secs of time. Service is the backbone of brand image and we always work hard and try to give best of after sales service, we continuously work on giving fastest and best of services to all end users.”

Mr. Siril Muthirakkal, Sales Manager - India Region, Foxconn Middle east-India-Africa “India is such a market where people look for value for money rather than the cheaper product. One can reach in commendable position by focussing in Quality, Service and implementing partner-friendly strategies. Currently, Foxconn is positioned at TOP 4 amog Tier #1 brands. The major schema is to focus on healthy ROI than to be top on the ranking. And, you need to be careful when spending as DT growth is not as high as mobile solutions. So, conservativeness pays here. We have seen many players vanished in the recent past due to short-term strategies. In short, motherboard solutions needs simple business logic and care where you can get bigger share of the cake, securing the financials at the same time.”

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catering to the diverse segments and helping in bridging the digital divide by bringing new technology and innovation to people’s Life.

“MSI always strived to provide digital products based on its core values –“Innovation” The results are products with superior performance, trusted reliability, excellent user experience and expressive style. MSI Motherboards have OC Genie technology to overclock our products apart from the BIOS adjustments & software. By using MSI OC Genie motherboard, end user can easily overclock by just pushing a bottom or click their mouse. It helps overclockers to save their time and by this technology also helps those who people don’t know too much about technical part to save their money. Over clock technology not only use in MSI mother board, but also in MSI graphic card. In all MSI graphics card, we provide Afterburner software, by using afterburner software it helps users to adjust the graphic performance easily,” said, Kuo of MSI India.

“AMD is a longtime favorite of performance enthusiasts and overclockers around the world. AMD last week got in to the Guinness World Record for the “Highest Frequency of a Computer Processor,” by overclocking the upcoming 8-core AMD FX desktop processor. The AMD FX CPU, set to launch in the fourth quarter of 2011, achieved a top speed of 8.429 GHz, surpassing the previous record of 8.308 GHz. Along with world-record frequencies, the AMD FX processor will enable an unrivaled enthusiast PC experience for the money – extreme multi-display gaming, mega-tasking and HD content creation. AMD is closely working with reviewers and gaming enthusiasts that enable reviewers to experience overclocking through reviews and overclocking contests,” said, Raghuraman of AMD India.

“To deliver the premium product to users, ASRock has thrown everything you could want at its full-line motherboard series. The useful software includes the ASRock exclusive X F a s t U S B a n d XFast LAN tools. T h e s i g n i f i c a n t p e r f o r m a n c e increase of ASRock Motherboard has been heavily spotlighted by global professional IT media. For instance, A S R o c k Z 6 8 Extreme4 mainboard has just received “2011 Recommended Buy Award” from t h e i n d u s t r y ’ s leading IT media – Tom’sHardware,” said, Lee of AsRock.

GIGABYTE has been consistently working on bringing

overclocking features into even its mainstream motherboard models. “GIGABYTE A75 series motherboards are designed to get the very best performance from the latest AMD A75 platform supports the latest 32 nanometer AMD A-Series APU or accelerated processing units. The AMD A-Series APUs are the first ever to combine high performance graphics processor with a choice of a dual or quad core CPU in one silicon die, offering a 3 D g a m i n g and multimedia e x p e r i e n c e s i m i l a r t o a discrete graphics c o n f i g u r a t i o n . Featuring several state-of-the-art onboard solutions f r o m i n d u s t r y h e a v y h i t t e r s including Creative a n d B i g f o o t Networks, as well as qui te a few new and exclusive G I G A B Y T E f e a t u r e s , t h e G I G A B Y T E G1-Killer series motherboards are equipped to let gamers unleash total mass gaming destruction. The

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GIGABYTE X58A-OC motherboard is the first overclocking specific, enthusiast designed motherboard that introduces never-seen-before tweaking and insulating features,” said, Grewal of Gigabyte Technology.

“Performance boards are primary driven by VR and thermal, and since we are very focused on design margins, so from product standpoint, many customers have recognized that. We are also increasing our investments and offerings in this series by launching several more skus in coming months, this will increase customer's choice. Moreover, we are working very closely with top gamers and over-clockers to improve what matters to them, said, Ravichandran of Intel.

“Since we are mainly focused on the low power green motherboard segment, we don’t really have a presence in the overclocking and enthusiast markets. Our Mini-ITX boards, however, are very popular for modders and if you look at websites like www.mini-itx.com you will see that they have been used for a lot of interesting projects. We hope that the same can happen in India too in the future,” said, Phadke of VIA Technologies.

“Biostar established in 1986, when Biostar first established, our focus is the middle and entry level motherboards and we have very good result by giving quality and reasonable priced motherboards, but Biostar is not the cheapest, our focus is quality, service and reasonable price,” said, Wu of Biostar.

“We are already doing a 140 city road-show NEXTECH 2011 along with our active networking team from DIGISOL to reach out to SI community which caters to overclockers, gamers & enthusiasts. Come next quarter we will take our reach to campuses across India

Trithankar Guha, Jupiter International ND for ASROCK“In this sector the competitions are getting tougher as day progresses. Particularly, Laptops are growing very sharply in Metros; the categories C, D and E class are emerging to be most potential area. In this fiercely competition, we are positioning our brand quality product at an affordable price points for all the segments of users. We have targeted all the System Integrators in these cities and appointed our Channel Partners to reach out to them. Beside, to motivate them for delivering additional volume, we have floated slab wise Incentives for our SIs. In metro cities we are extending out base of Channel Partners to large extend and increasing their backend rebate to have them more focused and enhancing the total volume. As after sales service is one of the most important factors in Motherboards.”

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to showcase our prowess & capability in making motherboards,” said, Sharma of Digilite.

“Right, there is market growing up for Overclocking, Modding and ZOTAC is well aware about it and being we are one of the Best brand in Graphics card we know the importance of overclocking hence ZOTAC have design several thing for end-user to enjoy that, for example – ZOTAC have Firestorm Software to overclock the Graphics card, Performance Analyzer software to analyze the performance of the components, Lucid Virtu features with Z68 Motherboard series so that User can switch the graphics. Our Mini-ITX series motherboards are well appreciated with a lot of gamer community for modd. So ZOTAC of course working with more new product to capitalize this market properly and we are focused to deliver the right product to users,” said, Gupta of Zotac India.

“ECS continues to hold gaming events in certain regions like Latin America, South East Asia (SEA) and Middle East and Africa (MEA) to reach gaming enthusiast. ECS also keeps providing the excellent performance products to power user and gamers. Therefore, ECS "Black Series" both in Intel and AMD platform motherboards meet the expectation of enthusiast market. For example, the latest ECS "Black Series" motherboards include A990FXM-A, P67H2-A, A75F-A, P55H-A, H67H2-M and upcoming Intel Sandy Bridge E platform. ECS has been working with some famous game events in the past and will continue putting effort on

such events. The goal is to promote ECS "Black Series" motherboards and ECS graphics cards in world wide. ECS "Black Series" offers users high performance and cost effectiveness. ECS is confident to be the top choice in the overclocking, modding and enthusiast markets,” sa id Ken of ECS.

“ASUS has been at the forefront of this trend with our Republic of Gamers or ROG brand established in 2006. Today ROG is synonymous with o v e r c l o c k i n g a n d gaming in the hardware world. We’ve been having gaming events, overclocking events and recently concluded a very successful power user meet which was a first of its kind event in India. In this meet we invited and educated top power users from India about overclocking and our various product developments and sought

their feedback on our products and offerings. Enthusiast segment is where maximum innovation

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happens in terms of product development and as such this segment is of prime importance to us. We’re also working on our own ROG certified gaming cafes that feature our hardware and provide gamers in the country with a very unique gaming experience,” said, Shetty of ASUS.

“We are incorporating the newest technology and trends into our products immediately as per the market changes. In India, our penetration is set to happen with aggressive schemes, road shows interactive events etc. Moreover, we perfectly balance the commercials of this segment’s products to make it affordable to India populace,” concluded Siril of Foxconn. Green Technology

“The global technology market is witnessing a growing race among manufacturers to introduce the lowest carbon emission and most environmentally friendly products in order to enable their customers to become a part of a healthy and green society tomorrow. Simmtronics is taking aggressive steps to accelerate this trend .This year we have launched VIA product with GO GREEN campaign and covered 20 cities show. Other then VIA most of our products are supporting Green Technology, we have recently launched. Simmtronics products are introduced after prolonged research and development and are sure to become the forefront of innovation,” said, Sabharwal of Simmtronics India.

“IT hardware companies can and should play a very critical role in green computing. Having said, I would like to add that GIGABYTE Technology has been one of the earliest adopters of ‘green computing’ initiatives in the global IT industry. All its motherboards, both high-end and entry-level models, come with unique technologies and features designed and proven to decrease the carbon footprint, improve energy efficiencies, lower power consumption, reduce electrical waste, and rationalize system temperature,” said, Grewal of Gigabyte India.

“We have a dedicated group which monitors, plans and implements all green initiatives around the globe. RoHS lead free compliance, Eco-Smart, energy star... Intercepting Halogen free. At Intel, Green is not just a buzzword but our strong belief,” said, Ravichandran of Intel.

“In this scenario of market-fall, green technology has been an important area to be developed to get rid of unwanted / unused components within the product.. Every reputed organization is getting into green investments to ensure their positive contribution to the nation. Foxconn have made this “Green” (RoHs-II) initiative 2 years back in India with some of the local SIs to help them to accomplish their vision,” said, Siril of Foxconn.

Green technology is the future as any technology has to be sustainable and viable for the users as well as their environment. “We at ASUS are fully committed to creating a sustainable future. We believe in adopting an eco-friendly approach towards every aspect of our business. This is where the Green ASUS philosophy comes in — from our internal practices to our production processes, to our green products and

our environmentally-aware employees — we remain focused on safeguarding our planet. ASUS produced the world's first lead-free and Halogen –free motherboard as well as the first Halogen-free full-HD Monitor. ASUS was recognized for its Energy Efficient Product Design at the 2011 ENERGY STAR Award Ceremony thanks to the Super Hybrid Engine and Green LCD technologies. Today, ASUS-exclusive technologies are continually being designed and improved with the main goal of environmental conservation in mind.,” said, Shetty of ASUS.

“For past 24 years, ECS has developed with green company culture. Not only providing innovative technology but also taking care of global environment, ECS promises to improve the quality of life for everyone as a part of global family. The ECS eGS (Easy Green Saver) is the best example for green technology. ECS eGS (Easy Green Saver) is a simple and easy-to-use application for efficient power saving solution ,” said Ken of ECS.

“Save environment is our social responsibility and ZOTAC is committed to do so hence we always use PB free components, our all products are RoHS and ERP Ready, We are proud to have received the ISO 9001:2000, ISO 14001 and OHSAS 18001 accreditations for our Quality System, Environmental Management System and Occupational Health & Safety Management System respectively,” said, Gupta of Zotac India.

“We emphasize and go-green slogan for all products and business. We have done due changes in the manufacturing process and components to make the process and final product as an energy saving product. This effort is carried on in all Mercury products,” said, Das of Kobian India.

“More important than money, green technology is a must; there are many signs we see everyday, it is everyone’s responsibility to protect our planet, Biostar is one of the first motherboard manufacturer to implement green technology in motherboards, we call it G.P.U. (Green Power Utility), after our lab test, with this Biostar feature, it can save up to 88% of power and even in heavy load conditions, it can still save up to 27% of power,” said, Wu of Biostar.

“It’s very important that we continue to focus on minimizing the carbon footprints of PC and other technology products to reduce their impact on the environment. Improving energy efficiency is an important first step, but we also need to ensure we use the most environmentally friendly material and processes for manufacturing and develop additional energy sources such as solar for powering PCs. This is particularly important for countries like said, Phadke of VIA Technologies.

“In response to the increasingly stringent environmental regulations and the demands of our international clientele, provide environmentally friendly products and services to consumers and move towards the goals of green design,

green resources and green technology, thus we have taken Eco design into consideration during the R&D and design phases of a product. All of our products use environmentally friendly materials for packaging to make sure our products meet the RoHS, WEEE and ErP requirements. Our ultimate goal is to develop products that are environmentally friendly and offer great performance. MSI and its suppliers will work together towards the aforementioned goals, starting with the procurement of raw materials to render all MSI products conform to the four tenets of “low hazard”, ‘extended product life’, “energy saving” and “ease of recycling” and observe the three Rs -- reduce, reuse, recycle,” said, Kuo of MSI India.

“Proof of the pudding is in eating. The entire new AMD APUs consumer much less power compared to the competition. This translates in to lower energy costs and better battery life etc. We completely endorse the idea of “green technology products”. For over a decade AMD has established a record of environmental responsibility and transparency. A robust management system is in place to manage risks to the environment from our operations, and we engage employees worldwide to take an active role in conservation efforts. AMD is working actively to make CPUs that are high on performance and low on energy consumption. APU technology from AMD is more energy efficient than previous generations. Not only are our new products energy efficient but, according to the SMART 2020 study, is applying digital technology to increase energy efficiency” concluded, Raghuraman Pattabiraman of AMD India.At Last

The Indian Desktop market has seen a surge of 6% in 2010-11 and the overall PC sales is expected to have a growth of 35% in this fiscal over last FY. The total volume would be around 12.3 Mn including Notebook and Desktop. Therefore, the Motherboard market would be in upward trend. But, the majority of growth, more than 50% would be from B, C and D class cities

Over the past decade, the motherboard industry has gone through a few rough patches. The economic recessions over the past few years really show in the number of players left in the game. And if the current economic climate has anything to say about it, it is possible that this is not the end of the list. It is important to point out that some of these brands are not the result of dead companies. Some have just simply exited from the channel motherboard business.

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