HP, Olympus offer Malaysia sales projections
By
Mike Tomkins
(Monday, December 8, 2003 - 12:05 EST)
Browsing news from around the web this morning, we came across two interesting articles published in the last few days by Malaysia's "Star" newspaper.
Both look at sales projections offered for the Malaysian market by digicam manufacturers, but offer some statistics that may be of interest to readers around the world.
In the first article published last Friday, HP projects sales of 6000 cameras in Malaysia next year. The figure sounds small, but would apparently put HP in the top 10 digicam manufacturers in terms of unit sales for that country.
The second article published on Saturday details Olympus' aim to capture a 10% share of the Malaysian digital SLR market with its E-1 model. In an interesting parallel by Tan Tick Boon, Olympus Malaysia's Managing Director, the company's cameras are equated with Toyota's cars - whilst the Olympus E-1 is compared to a Lexus (the luxury brand launched by Toyota in 1987).
Some interesting tidbits from the two articles: - Demand for digicams in Malaysia is growing 19% annually
- HP markets its digital cameras in North America, some European countries (including Britain and Germany), and the Gulf States. In these regions, HP's market share ranges from 4 to 8%.
- HP is newly introducing its digital cameras to 10 Asia Pacific markets, including Australia.
- The AsiaPac market currently generates some 4 million digital camera unit sales annually.
- January to October digicam unit sales in Malaysia this year were almost double those of the same period in 2002. During the same period, the average cost of a camera fell around 13%, from RM (Ringgit Malaysia) 1600 to RM1400 (roughly equivalent to US$421 / 368 respectively, ignoring exchange rate fluctuations, taxes and duties).
- Olympus' projections are for its digital SLR sales worldwide to grow between 140% to 300% (rather a wide range) to as high as one million units in 2004 - potentially meaning its DSLR sales would surpass those of its film SLRs next year.
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