Electronics manufacturer PT Panasonic Gobel Indonesia has had a presence in Indonesia for more than 40 years, known for its brand National for the first three decades. In 2004, National changed its name to Panasonic and the company’s name became Panasonic Gobel. The Jakarta Post’s Tassia Sipahutar talked to Panasonic Gobel Indonesia president director Ichiro Suganuma on the company’s business progress and challenges so far. Here are the excerpts of the interview:
Question: How has business been for Panasonic?
Answer: It has been great even though competition is getting tougher. Our sales have increased 22 percent since last April [Panasonic’s financial year runs from April to March]. Everything is as we expect because we target double-digit growth for the year ending in March 2013.
Which product shows the biggest improvement?
In terms of growth, our water pump business shows the best improvement since Panasonic completed the acquisition of Sanyo last March. Sales have skyrocketed 72 percent. At the moment, we sell water pumps under the Sanyo and Panasonic brands. But in terms of number of products sold, air conditioners [AC] still dominates sales. From April to [December last year], we have sold more than 550,000 AC units for household use only, rising by 22 percent from a year before. We have not included sales for offices, schools or hospitals. So, the number is big. Sales of refrigerators and washing machines have increased as well, 34 percent and 12 percent, respectively.
How do you compete with other household appliance manufacturers?
We are number one in the water pump and AC markets, and number three or four in the refrigerator segment. We focus on manufacturing products that consume less electricity and are durable. We also customize them to serve the specific requirements of Indonesian customers. It turns out that Indonesians like freezers and ice cubes a lot, so they want to have a bigger freezer in their refrigerators. They want their washing machines to have a faster spin tub as well.
Question: How has business been for Panasonic?
Answer: It has been great even though competition is getting tougher. Our sales have increased 22 percent since last April [Panasonic’s financial year runs from April to March]. Everything is as we expect because we target double-digit growth for the year ending in March 2013.
Which product shows the biggest improvement?
In terms of growth, our water pump business shows the best improvement since Panasonic completed the acquisition of Sanyo last March. Sales have skyrocketed 72 percent. At the moment, we sell water pumps under the Sanyo and Panasonic brands. But in terms of number of products sold, air conditioners [AC] still dominates sales. From April to [December last year], we have sold more than 550,000 AC units for household use only, rising by 22 percent from a year before. We have not included sales for offices, schools or hospitals. So, the number is big. Sales of refrigerators and washing machines have increased as well, 34 percent and 12 percent, respectively.
How do you compete with other household appliance manufacturers?
We are number one in the water pump and AC markets, and number three or four in the refrigerator segment. We focus on manufacturing products that consume less electricity and are durable. We also customize them to serve the specific requirements of Indonesian customers. It turns out that Indonesians like freezers and ice cubes a lot, so they want to have a bigger freezer in their refrigerators. They want their washing machines to have a faster spin tub as well.
Those things may seem simple, but are important for our customers. White goods [household appliances] do not work the same way as brown goods [consumer electronics], such as televisions. They need more components to step up their quality. Nobody wants to buy a refrigerator if it is not cold. This results in higher production costs and prices. On the other hand, televisions are getting cheaper and cheaper as they use fewer components. Unfortunately for us, Panasonic is not a major player in the television market. We have not found the best way to manufacture top-quality televisions with relatively low prices. We do not want to risk producing low-quality televisions.
So, what is your strategy to improve television sales?
We are still working on that. So far our LCD [liquid-crystal display] televisions are imported from our factory in Malaysia, while our plasma televisions are imported from our factory in Thailand. We have several options to improve sales. We can bring in other imported television products and just put our brand on them, but we do not want to do that because we have a responsibility for quality to uphold for our customers.
source : the jakarta post
So, what is your strategy to improve television sales?
We are still working on that. So far our LCD [liquid-crystal display] televisions are imported from our factory in Malaysia, while our plasma televisions are imported from our factory in Thailand. We have several options to improve sales. We can bring in other imported television products and just put our brand on them, but we do not want to do that because we have a responsibility for quality to uphold for our customers.
source : the jakarta post
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