Dell to start making computers in India by year-end

New Delhi, May 25: Dell Inc, global leader in personal computer production and sales, today said its manufacturing facility will start operations in India by the end of this year; without specifying however, the location of the plant.

Dell Asia Pte Ltd Vice President and General Manager South Asia Paul-Henri Ferrand told reporters that the location of the company's unit would be disclosed in a few weeks.

Dell plant's location has been a subject of speculation in India, especially after the company had earlier last year announced plans to set up its base in Andhra Pradesh.

However, sources in the government had stated that the company is now keen on Maharashtra on the Mumbai-Pune highway.

''Asia Pacific is our fastest growing region, and India has a contributed significantly to it. India saw a 40 per cent increase in its revenue for Q1, with sales increasing by 51 per cent. Our new plant which will start production by the year end will help us in acheiving more market share and will help us in realising our dream of being the number one in India,'' Mr Ferrand said.

On a poser about the location Mr Ferrand said, '' We have not decided on the location as yet, but will be announcing it in a few weeks. We are looking at places like Delhi, Kolkata, Mumbai and Bangalore and will decide on factors like logistics, infrastructure and incentives,'' But he did not mention Andhra Pradesh confirming it has dropped its plans to go there.

Dell plans to focus on the midsize market as this segment has shown a significant growth in the past few years.

''We had a market share of five per cent in the last quarter and our sales doubled in the last three quarters with the major chunk of it coming from the mid size segment'',Dell Vice President and General Manager (Sales and Marketing) Rajan Anandan said.

Dell already has a global development solutions centre in Bangalore.

The management last week had announced that the company would start selling servers with AMD's Opteron chips, thus breaking its long-term, exclusive partnership with Intel.

UNI