Casio eyes 10% sales from India in 5 years

Casio Computer Co, a leading Japanese player in musical instruments and watches, is renewing focus on business in India.
The company’s global heads across market planning and research and development (R&D) made a visit to India this week - a first in many years. The company’s subsidiary Casio India is increasing advertising spend by 200% this year compared to last year.

“Clearly, Casio’s top management’s expectations from India is increasing and we are increasing our spends in line with the growth we are witnessing here. Watches are the fastest growing category for us in India,” Kulbhushan Seth, head - sales and marketing, Casio India, said.

He said the company was doubling watch business annually as a result of its retail overhaul, where it increased distribution and visibility in modern retail outlets. On Wednesday, the company launched a new collection of its G-Shock watches in India.

Casio expects growth in India to be in line with markets such as China and Russia. “India’s contribution to global sales is very small, but the growth is huge here. In 3-5 years, India could start contributing 10%,” Toru Tanaka, general manager, timepiece marketing division, Casio Computer Co said. Japan continues to be the biggest market for the company while US, Europe and Asia all contribute similar sales.

“Our sales from Hong Kong, Singapore and America have been quite good, but in India we previously did not have as much retail space for our brands. We were operating out of small corners at multi-brand departmental stores. But we have now launched a new shop-in-shop concept for all our brands and have started advertising them more. And we are seeing that sales in India are growing rapidly,” Tanaka said.

Casio has 90% market share in calculators and a major player in musical keyboards in the country. Its market share in watches, however, is around 3%.

The company, however, is seeing watches priced Rs3,000- 8,000 selling the fastest. It is also seeing consumers uptrading to watches priced Rs10,000-15,000 and is launching more premium watches priced upward of Rs22,000 under its Edifice brand. The company sells watches in `500-45,000 range in India.