Taiwan's BenQ joins Indian cellphone gold rush

By siliconindia staff writer   |   Thursday, 23 October 2003, 19:30 IST
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NEW DELHI: Taiwanese mobile handset giant BenQ Corp on Wednesday became the third major producer in a month to launch into India, as global leaders turn from saturated markets in Europe and the United States to grow sales. The country would help BenQ boost its worldwide sales by 20 percent next year from about 16 million units in 2003, BenQ associate vice president Harrison Chang said. BenQ, Taiwan's biggest computer peripherals and handset maker, is aiming for five per cent of India's total GSM handset sales, which it estimates at 8-10 million, by end-2004. But that sales total is conservative in a country where 9.5 million GSM handsets are expected to be sold this year and where only two per cent of its billion-plus people have a mobile phone, against 19 per cent in China and more than 60 per cent in Europe. India has about 19 million GSM users and six million on CDMA.