Compaq to start making PCs at Bangalore plant
Frank:
I think Jan/Feb should be good months for the stock,where as Nov/Dec normally have been so so months, at least historically.
First HP,then Digital,now Compaq ,now I think I am going to send a copy of this article to DELL.
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(Courtesy:Fiancial Express,India)
Compaq to start making PCs at Bangalore plant
Deepak Kumar & T M Arun Kumar
New Delhi (India)
Compaq Computer, the world's largest manufacturer of PCs, will soon start manufacturing its range of PCs and PC servers in the country. The company plans to start assembling the PCs and PC servers at the erstwhile Digital Equipment facility at Bangalore from the first quarter of calendar 1999.
"We are looking at assembling Compaq PCs and PC servers in India. We hope to start from Q1 of 1999," said Som Mittal, Compaq Technologies India's Managing Director and CEO. PCs and PC servers manufactured here will be for the Indian market, he added. It is understood that the company plans to manufacture about 50,000 to 60,000 machines per annum to begin with.
Digital Equipment India Ltd (DEIL), before being bought over by Compaq, used to manufacture its PC line in its Bangalore facility. In fact, there had been intense speculation that Compaq will start using this as a base to manufacture its PC lines after the merger.
It doesn't cost much for Compaq to start assembling its PCs here in the country. The company, with its worldwide acquisition of Digital, has inherited a sophisticated plant, complete with robotic tool-sets. Many of these tools were either hired out on contract manufacturing to other companies, or are lying idle. This includes an automated PCB processing machine. Analysts said the plant could be upgraded at relatively low costs to support more manufacturing functions and can be optimized for flexible, high capacity manufacturing.
To support the plant, there are several companies in the country making a number of sub-systems at cheaper prices. Cerebra, for instance, now makes a number of NICs and specialized cards. DEIL was also outsourcing from C-MOS, for a period.
When Digital Equipment first set up shop in the country, it started off with a manufacturing plant at its Bangalore facility. At that time, customs on imported computer systems were exorbitantly high. Therefore it made sense for the company, as did it for all other computer companies who opted to operate in India, to fine-tune the scale of their manufacturing in the country, on a continuous basis. So DEIL erected an automated plant at the basement of what is its current headquarters.
"Having already made a substantial investment in the plant, Digital made it a regional PC integration plant," said Kapil Jain, then GM, Personal Systems, DEIL. Jain, now a Director at Compaq, said the plant was responsible for integrating major sub-systems it received into whole machines, adding those components that were available locally at a much lower price [like NIC cards, keyboard components, certain PCBs, etc.] This was not only for consumption within the country but the entire sub-continent.
Then came the merger. Today Classic Digital, as the assets of erstwhile DEIL are referred to, carries only a few models of the Digital PC line, as many of Compaq's models directly clash. And the volumes now justify a local control over putting together machines. A view already transformed into action by HP, which has started manufacturing at its new plant in Electronic City, Bangalore.
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