Moser Baer to focus on LED products to tap growing market

Eyeing to tap the burgeoning LED market, tech-manufacturing firm Moser Baer plans to enhance product portfolio and develop strong distribution network as it expects the government's smart city programme to give a major boost to the demand for such devices in future.
The company is also scouting for opportunities in government tenders and contract manufacturing for established large brands, besides directly selling to consumers to grow its LED segment.
Not worried by its late entry in the segment, Moser Baer is expecting to have up to seven per cent market share in next three years.
"We would have a market of Rs 500 crore by FY 2018-19 with 6 to 7 per cent market share. This year it would be sub Rs 100 crore but is growing rapidly. We would have over Rs 1,000 crore plus market in next five to six years," Moser Baer CEO Shiv Nath told PTI.

Industry body ELCOMA is estimating that LED market will be around Rs 21,000 crore by 2020.
On product portfolio, Nath said that Moser Baer has made very focused investment in R&D for it.

"We have chosen focused products, which constitute 80 per cent of the market as downlights, pannel lights and fixtures, tube lights, bulbs and then we have street lights and downlights for warehousing etc," he said.
It is also working to develop network of wireless control LED devices aiming to participate in the government's plan to develop 100 smart cities.
"We are developing our own technology, which would be a very low cost wireless system. It would be highly competitive and we would have prototypes in next six months," he said.

The entire R&D work for these future compatible LEDs is done in India, he added.
Moser Baer has forayed into direct selling of LED this year and is presently building its sales channels and has appointed its distributors network for b2c sales in 12 states.
Apart from that Moser Baer also recently launched its online ecommerce portal and has associations with mobile commerce platform Paytm and other online channel partners such as Snapdeal, Flipkart etc.
"We already have an online presence through partners and will accelerate digital marketing efforts. We have also designed and launched a mobile app for consumers to adopt understand LED better," he said.

Moser Baer is also exporting its LED to some Middle East countries and neighbouring nations as Sri Lanka etc.
"We are building the export market slowly in new geographies like Europe and the USA," Jain said.
Last year, Moser Baer had a turnover of Rs 12,000 crore from its various verticals and 65 per cent was from exports.