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The Smart Techie was renamed Siliconindia India Edition starting Feb 2012 to continue the nearly two decade track record of excellence of our US edition.

January - 2011 - issue > Buyers Perspective

Intel Eyes Rural India

Hari Anil
Thursday, January 6, 2011
Hari Anil
What is Intel’s biggest challenge in Indian market and how do plan to address it?
The PC penetration of India is comparatively less as opposed to that of China, Australia and Japan. Every 10 percentage increase in broadband connectivity and PC penetration will have a significant impact on the GDP of the country. Thus, PC connectivity, broadband and people utilizing these, are all linked to the economic growth of this country, be it in the consumer segment or in the SMB segment. Thus, the biggest challenge that Intel faces in the Indian market today is how to increase the PC penetration and resolving this will be our biggest mission in the next couple of years.

Multiple factors need to fall into place in order to make a change in the issue of PC penetration. First among these is ‘connectivity’. In India, the broadband penetration is just 8-10 percent, much smaller when compared to other countries. But the roll out of 3G wireless services will make a huge difference. Today customers not only want a PC but rather a connected PC and how one optimizes it and hits the market will be a big initiative. That is something that we are focusing on.

The second is how the customers are going to use the PC once they have it. A good percentage of common man does not speak English so we need to get vernacular content in the PC. At Intel, we are working to achieve this. We work with various service providers and application vendors, and have an initiative called app up stores where we will create vernacular content and applications and reach out to people. This will make sure the PC is relevant for the common man.

Another initiative is ePCO, where we work with the government of Karnataka, BSNL and ItzCash. There are about 5000 PCOs in Karnataka, and all these are given an option to upgrade themselves to ePCOs. With this we aim to drive self-employment, bridge the digital divide and increase IT adoption in semi-urban and rural areas.

What are you looking to do in mobile device segment like Tablets and other hand held devices?

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