What is Numeric’s say on Indian UPS market?

 

The Indian UPS market growth for the calendar year 2016 has been quite flattish. The line interactive and Single Phase UPS market has been flat while the Three-phase UPS market has had a significant growth.
 

However, going ahead we expect a steady growth. The factors driving the growth would be digitalization activities across sectors including GoI Digital India initiative, the need of clean power across Industries, penetration of sensitive electronic gadgets in homes and hence the need for clean and uninterrupted power at home, various infrastructure projects, the growth of surveillance needs, distance education projects, digitalization of entertainment etc. We believe that the IT/ITES, Government, Infrastructure & Education segments to grow faster than the rest of the segments.
 

The total size of the UPS market in India has been established at Rs 2200 crore (This is only UPS market without taking into consideration the batteries that form a part of the UPS system.) (Source: Frost & Sullivan).  
 

Numeric is a now part of the Legrand Group, your role and future goals.

 

Legrand has been a trendsetter and is known worldwide to drive innovation in all its products. It is a trusted solution provider with ethical business practice, which makes us revered among peers and customers alike.
 

Legrand acquired Numeric in India in 2012. Under the Legrand group, Numeric now has access to expertise from across the world. This coupled with deep knowledge and expertise of the Indian market makes Numeric a truly global organization.
 

We plan to continuously design new products and engage with all stakeholders of the UPS market like specifiers, IT heads, system integrators, installers, facility managers, end users etc. Our growth is driven by -innovation, design and user-friendliness of our products, which are the keystones of our brand philosophy. We believe in driving growth, gaining customer-confidence and market share through these parameters at each step.
 

India still is a growing market and has huge potential both in terms of volume and in terms of value. Our prime objective at this point is to grow faster (x2) than the market.
 

Major challenges faced by Numeric in the industry today?

Some of the challenges been faced by the Industry are:
 

• Lack of standardization-we would like Bureau of Indian Standards (BIS) to be more proactive in terms of ensuring that the products are being sold in India adhere to the standards prescribed by BIS
• Volatility in the price of lead and the USD exchange rate. Lead is an important component and in the recent months, it has been extremely volatile. This affects the input costs and as a consequence the price and margin. Same is true for USD.
• Some of the market segments are becoming extremely price sensitive. The only factor been considered is the price and not the Value. Hence, a lot of cheap imports are coming in.
• GST should be a great help in making the market better in terms of compliance. This should help all organized and professional manufactures like Numeric.
• Major manufacturers like Numeric should play a more active role in educating/informing the market stakeholders about the technological changes and their benefits.

We, at Numeric, are constantly engaged in maximizing value for our customers. We do not believe in  price competition. We work hard to provide the best price vs value proposition to our customers. We are also devoting our energy in providing our customers the best service (pre sales and post sales).

Your future plans for greater market share?

 

Numeric is already one of the 3 biggest UPS manufacturers in India. We are the undisputed leaders in Line Interactive and Online Single Phase UPS. In fact we have been rated as the number 1 in Line Interactive and Single Phase in India for the past 24 years by Soft Disk. In the last 2 years we have also become one of the biggest players in online Three Phase and Modular UPS.
 

Going ahead we intend to grow faster than the market growth in order to consolidate our market share. We intend to do this by continuously bringing to the market state of the art technology and couple that with world class service through our wide service network.
 

Numeric’s biggest strength has been its ability to always be at the cutting edge of UPS technology. This ability was further strengthened when Numeric became a part of the Legrand group which gave us access to the global expertise of Legrand combined with our local knowledge of customers and applications.
 

We plan to continue to design new products in this segment and engage with all stakeholders like specifiers, system integrators, installers, distributors, end users etc. Our growth is powered by innovation, design and user-friendliness in our products, which are the very cornerstones of our brand philosophy. We believe in driving growth, gaining customer-confidence and market share through these parameters at each step.
 

Impact on GST in the UPS business?

GST should be a great help in making the market better in terms of compliance. This should help all organized and professional manufacturers like Numeric.

We expect some ‘turbulence’ in the market during the first one-two months post GST implementation. This is a new structure, and the market will take some time to be ‘in tune’ with it. Some challenges with regard to registration, rules, credit for existing stocks, pricing, etc. remain. It would require great efforts from the stakeholders to be ready in time for the GST implementation.

We at Numeric have been working on the subject for a long time now- both in terms of getting our ERP systems ready for GST,as well as playing a leading role in educating our entire value chain about the impact and changes it would entail in their business operations.

We are a bit disappointed at the GST rate for UPS at 28%. This would be close to 10% higher, in most states, than the previous combination of Excise Duty + VAT. Hence, for the final consumers it would mean higher prices. Those consumers who would be able to take credit for GST against their output taxes will not be affected but those who cannot will be. (especially homeowners).

However, in the mid/long term we believe it’s a very good initiative in terms of making the country a common market and making it easier for products to move across states. It would also increase compliance with respect to taxes and therefore significantly reduce, if not eliminate, wrong/unethical practices. This can only be very good news for professional manufacturer’s like Numeric.