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The IT channel community of Shimla feels that the region has got enough
business potential and it's high time that national distributors open their
offices here. At the recently held IT Panchayat, organized by DQ Channels and
The DQ Week at Shimla, partners of the region came face to face with
representatives from national distributors and put forth their issues of
concern.
One of their biggest concerns was the absence of distributors in the city.
Anil Sharma of Shimla's Ace Infotech felt that it was about time that national
distributors like Ingram Micro or Redington opened their offices in the city.
Due to the lack of a regional office partners face a lot of problems related to
service, replacements and other issues such as dead on arrival (DoA).
“We firmly believe that today, this market is growing at a good pace. This
should have been an encouraging situation for distributors. But sadly it has not
prompted them to open their offices in Shimla,” Sharma noted.
Speaking on this issue, Satnam Singh Atwal from Access Marketing Services
said that it takes a lot of time and effort to get the products to Shimla.
Things may change if distributors start their offices in the city. “Often we
have had to send our people to collect the material from these distributors in
Parwanoo or even to Chandigarh at times. This is really hurting our business. As
a community we would surely benefit a lot if distributors start their offices
here with local billing,” he added.
Reacting to this issue, SP Singh of Ingram Micro India said that his company
is fully committed towards working for the channel community. “As of now we have
our warehouse at Parwanoo and it just takes two days to take the material from
Parwanoo to Shimla. So this way we are trying our best to meet the requirements
of this region,” he added.
Cartel formation
Another issue that cropped up during the debate was that of cartels formed
by big distributors. Bhupender Singh Verma from Himtron said that this cartel
formation is hurting the overall channel community badly leading to a lot of
other malpractices.
“It hurts us because you never know when the price of a particular product
comes down. Distributors engaged in this practice should certainly not do it,”
he demanded.
“Distributors and the IT channel work hand in hand. We will always be looking
at working closely with the IT channel community,” Sunil Suri from Redington
explained.
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