EB: What opportunities Indian market offers you?
India is fast emerging as a major global hub for R&D projects to deliver new generation products faster to the global market. Short R&D cycles need rapid PCB prototyping for manufacturing and testing of the elements’ design. These will drive demand for PCB prototypes, indicating a positive outlook for the next few years. Changes in import taxes on electronic products have opened the Indian market to Chinese suppliers. This means competing for volume PCB orders for consumer electronics is now a challenging business.
We are focused on providing the services needed in the specialist electronics markets such as R&D, medical, defence, telecommunications, infrastructure and industrial electronics. In this market, we expects an annual growth rate of 25-50 per cent annually, and we target to achieve a growth rate double the current market trend.
EB: How are you planning to grow your business in India?
Our goal is not to measure the company against the overall Indian PCB market but to offer the required services to our chosen market sectors. The size of this market will allow us to grow our business securely and profitably. Currently, we have 1,000 online registered customers in India and we plan to add 1,750 more by 2010 end.
Our goal is not to reach market leadership in turnover but to become the market leader in number of orders. We want every electronics designer to turn to PCB Power when he needs a PCB prototype or small series.
EB: What is your business strategy for the Indian market?
PCB Power is focused on constantly increasing its customer base and number of orders. Our business model is based on the number of orders we deliver—our services will get better and more reliable if we deliver more number of orders efficiently. At the same time, we are looking for long term partnerships with our customers. Hence, we constantly develop new and targeted services. If we consistently provide reliable quality and prompt deliveries, these will hold the key of our success.
Our goal is to extend our existing industrial base in India. To ensure the quality, continuity and relevance of our services, we need to keep our production facilities close to our market. But presently we do not have any plans of setting up a facility unit in India. But we will keep on investing on this front.
EB: Tell us about your foray into PCB assembly ?
We have recently acquired the Ahmedabad based EMS company Hirel Circuit which has state of the art production capabilities. The new operation ensures that even the fastest delivery requirements are met on time. It will also offer our engineers to work closely with the customers and optimise our new designs. For our customers, this will mean higher quality and more robust end products. The deal will help us serve our customers better. We are continuously looking for new ways to enhance their products and save their precious time and money.
EB: Can you share with us your manufacturing capabilities in Ahmedabad?
We have a complete line for PCB assembly including pick and place machines, stencil printers, a reflow oven and a wave soldering machine. These capabilities enable us to deliver simple or complex PCB assemblies using surface mount technology, through hole and mixed technologies.
EB: What are the key segments you are targeting? What kind of services do you offer to your customers?
Our target customers are those who are designing and producing electronics in small to medium quantities. This includes design houses, R & D departments in telecommunications and automotive sectors, medical companies, defence and industrial electronics as well as universities and research institutes.
All our services are online ranging from PCB prototypes and small series to schematics and assembled board. We can deliver up to 16 layers single and double PCBs. We have short lead time for delivering the order as per demand. Also, the pricing of our PCBs depends on the delivery time and quantity. We offer different delivery options to our customers such as power value (prototype pooling service), verified (standard small series pooling service), verified plus (small series pooling service with options), express (non-pooling express service with next day deliveries) and on demand (full option non-pooling service up to 16 layers). We can also offer solutions in small volumes (up to 1,000 units).
EB: Where is PCB Power positioned in the competitive Indian market?
Fast product development cycles are needed to drive the growth of Indian electronics industry. Time to market is a critical factor in India. Professional electronics designers and companies cannot risk their time to market performance by using outmoded purchasing strategies. If they consistently buy only the cheapest, they risk ending up with poor performance. They need quality, reliability and premium customer service that we can offer them. So, you can define PCB Power’s position as the ‘best buy’.
