With the IT hardware industry no more being considered as an ?out-of-box? and ?off-the-shelf’ product pushing business, firms operating in the vertical are gearing up to make a foray into the solutions part of the business like virtualisation, mobility, cloud computing, heightened data storage requirements, digital home, personalisation, ubiquitous data access and security concerns to meet the ever-changing customer requirements. Sameer Garde, country manager, Dell India thinks that this shift is a critical inflection point that is going to redefine the type of products, which customers are going to demand from their technology providers. He tells S Saroj Kumar of FE, how Dell India sees this as an opportunity to differentiate itself from competitors and leapfrog with products, services and comprehensive solutions providing more flexibility and less complexity. Excerpts.
One often hears that Dell is transforming itself into a solutions company from a product company worldwide. Could you tell us how much of Indian centre will be leveraged in the entire transformation exercise?
We are launching a new era at Dell, one that advances the company beyond the direct, hardware-centric model without abandoning the aspects that made us so successful in the first place. Our new strategy is to move beyond the direct model and will transform the company from a leading hardware provider to one that provides the right technology solutions at the right price and in the right place. Dell will enhance its already intense focus on customers with increased investments in resources that deepen our customer relationships and provide us with even keener insight into the technology solutions, people and organizations to solve their problems. Contribution of Dell India R&D centre, the biggest lab in Asia region of the company, will be of immense use in this aspect. Dell India R&D centre is the software and solutions core competency centre for Dell’s worldwide business.
Is Dell working on tablet and cell phones and any updates on the Asia-Pacific market?
Dell?s business focus is to deliver communications solutions for wireless operators and their dedicated customers. We work with select carriers around the world to make the most of a person?s mobile experience, on any network, and using any application. We spur development and draw innovations from our partnering community to create products that extend the mobile experience. The introduction of smartphones and tablets represent one piece of Dell?s evolving mobile strategy.
When will the large-screen tablet ?Streak? from Dell be introduced in India?
India is one of the key markets for Dell consumer and as we work on the plans to bring the smartphones and tablet PCs to this market, we continue to explore various go-to-market options. However, we do not have any specific announcements for this right now.