While overall growth touched 26%, an analysis of the numbers reveals the severe pricing pressure Samsung faced in fiscal ’02-03. Knock out the telecom business pegged at Rs 237 crore, and you have the IT business—which saw growth rate drop to 14% (18% last year). Interestingly enough, mobile business revenues continued to increase their share in overall business from 3% in 2001 to 17% in 2003. The monitor business witnessed the highest fall in ASV—by about 17% (Rs 5,756)—compared to a 11% (Rs 6,945) fall last year. The net impact—units grew 19%, revenues fell 2%.

Heavy investment in combo promotions saw ASV in the OMS segment jump 13% (Rs 1,823). The importance of the combo to the overall picture is evident—this is the first time that any Samsung subsidiary worldwide used TV as a medium to push any product line. Also, ad spends in trying to upsell 7200-rpm HDDs helped keep the ASV in check—it fell only marginally, by 2%. Laser printers, still a small part of Samsung’s overall business, did pretty well, thanks to low entry pricing. (The price of entry-level laser printers has fallen from 18K for 6 ppm to 12K for 12 ppm.

A key initiative was Samsung’s entry into the PC business. The BUPC (buildurpc.com) brand was rolled out in smaller cities with a market demand of 10-50 units per month. Upselling, targeting the replacement market and trying to make a dent in the government segment is set to continue this year too.