V Srinivasan, director-sales & marketing, Tektronix India, discusses the dynamics of the Indian test, measurement & monitoring (T, M&M) market, as well as Tektronix’s strategies for capturing a sizeable chunk of this market with Shipra Arora

How mature is the Indian T, M&M market?
Test & measurement (T&M) is beginning to make its importance felt across the world. As an industry it is beginning to gain prominence in India. As new technologies evolve, testing plays a very important role. Networked appliances from computers, to mobile phones to special purpose information appliances will become ubiquitous, and the line between computing and communications products is blurring. A T&M company needs to be at least two years ahead of any new technology that is being launched, which will enable the testing of these new technologies before they are launched.

The Indian T, M&M market is approximately worth Rs 370 crore. Since India does not have a strong electronic manufacturing base like Taiwan, China or Korea it makes sense for India to rather leverage on its very strong pool of software engineers.

Has the sluggishness in the IT industry affected this particular segment?
The last year has definitely been affected by the economic slowdown. In India the major impact was felt in the software industry. On the positive side was investment in telecom infrastructure, both in cellular as well as basic services as also the broadcast industry. US sanctions also affected the sale of test equipment to many organisations in India, affecting companies like us in a major way. With the ban being recently relaxed (defence, PSUs, etc) things will definitely improve.

Explain Tektronix’s business focus in the T&M market?
Tektronix is focused on serving the measuring and monitoring needs of customers in the telecommunications and computer industries, including the relevant upstream semiconductor industry requirements. Within the telecommunications industry our focus includes both network infrastructure and subscriber equipment manufacturers, as well as service providers.

Three primary segments make up the telecommunications market: Core, Access and Mobile. While Tektronix has an entire communications focus, the communications BU with applications-specific products is focused on serving tomorrow’s measurement and monitoring needs of customers in two segments of Core and mobile. Within these segments we will focus on those specific high-growth areas at the leading edge of innovation where changing technology is creating new opportunities for aggressive competitors.

Tektronix’ businesses will focus on enabling the “food chain” from design and manufacture through network operators. Our intent includes network monitoring to address the “higher layers” within communication networks. It is within these higher layers that intelligence is being added within networks, multimedia services are created and services are identified for billing purposes.

How significant is Tektronix India in the overall growth plans of Tektronix Inc?
Tektronix India is very significant in the overall growth of Tektronix Inc. The revenue for Tektronix India this year will be approximately Rs 70 crore, which will be 8 percent of Asia Pacific revenues. We expect a growth of about 10-15 percent over the next two years.

Can you elaborate on the strategies you have outlined for the Indian market?
In terms of our marketing strategy we will be investing in technology seminars, participating in trade shows, presenting technical papers in major forums, etc.

Our focus segments will be in telecommunications, software development (computer industry, embedded design, telecom, etc) and broadcast. We will consolidate our leadership position in oscilloscopes, logic analysers, protocol testers, video products like waveform monitors, vector scopes, MPEG analysers and picture quality monitors.

In order to maintain an edge over our competitors like Agilent, our focus is on speed and agility in targeting segments undergoing dynamic change, and utilising strategic alliances to “look” bigger and to provide full solutions. In terms of competitors like Acterna, Lecroy, Fluke and Videotek, our strategy is to provide broader solutions in key enabling applications, employing a customer intimacy model and leveraging our global sales, service and product development. On the channels front we have both direct sales channel and a distribution network. We have 16 channel partners covering the country and we plan to increase this number to 20. Most of our business for the telecom and video markets is done by our direct sales force.