Panasonic opens India's first outlet in Chennai

New Delhi, Aug 28: Panasonic today opened its first outlet at Chennai, the country's first showroom which will house all models of 'Toughbook' range of mobile computers to different verticals.

''Ever since the launch of Panasonic's legendary Toughbooks in the country, we had been concentrating on institutional sales, especially of the rugged models in the niche verticals including the government enterprises'' said Third Wave Exim Chief Executive Officer Vijay Sheth.

Third Wave Exim is the sole national distributor for Panasonic Toughbooks in India.

This fiscal, the Third Wave expects business worth Rs 60 crore from sale of Toughbooks. The semi-rugged and ultra-portable series of Toughbooks are available at a price ranging between Rs 1,60,000 to Rs 3,00,000, whereas the rugged range starts at Rs 2,00,000 and goes upto Rs 6,00,00 depending on the feature set required.

The company has plans to open the market in East India as well in the next five months. The retail shops that Third Wave plans to partner with across the country will primarily be multi-brand outlets. It has plans to sign up two outlets in New Delhi, another two in Mumbai and one each in Bangalore, Pune and Ahmedabad in the first phase.

Panasonic Toughbooks are made as per MIL-standards and have a share of the market worldwide. The company enjoys major market share in the business laptop market in Japan. Eighty-four per cent of all the components that go into a Toughbook are manufactured by Matsushita.

UNI