“The market should grow this year: after so many years when investments were suspended, companies have to look towards technology again. (..) Last year I noticed that the market started to pick up,” Kero said.
He does not bet on a uniform rebound of the market this year.
“I don’t think there will be one particular sector that will see spectacular growth this year: several segments will see growth this year, but the overall picture will be a mixed one.”
The company’s target for its new fiscal year, which starts in April, is to become a top-three supplier of equipment in Romania in terms of revenues.
“The target for our new fiscal year, which starts on April 1, is to become no. 3 on the Romanian market, after IBM and HP, in terms of equipment-generated revenues. Our main focus is on storage systems, and we will target medium-sized and large companies.”
He explains that demand for storage systems is triggered to a certain extent by the increasingly big role of IT and the higher volume of electronic data, as well as by legal requirements for companies to store various categories of data for a certain amount of time.
Fujitsu does not sell its products directly in Romania, as rivals IBM and HP sometimes do, but works only through partners, Kero explained. “In Romania, Fujitsu’s business model is very clear, we sell only through partners.”
The company has four distributors (RHS, Lasting, Elko, and Asbis), 10 partners on the corporate segment (which include Asseco and S&T), and 40 national partners. Fujitsu’s team in Romania is made up of 14 people whose mission is to support partners’ sales, Kero explained.
“Our main target in Romania are companies. Our sales efforts are mainly focused on servers and storage systems.”
One of Fujitsu’s major clients in Romania is Petrom, the largest company in Romania. Fujitsu also sells locally Symantec software (backup and storage applications).
Last year, sales through our sales channels were 16% higher, said Kero. He did not offer details on the company’s turnover, citing communication rules imposed by the corporation. In the last quarter of 2011, the company sold around 5,000 laptops in Romania, according to a report of analysis company IDC, cited by Dell.
(English version by Daniela Stoican)