Hewlett-Packard to focus on mobile printing

Beijing: Committing itself to Prime Minister Narendra Modi's 'Digital India' initiative, US-based Hewlett-Packard has said it will focus on mobile printing and will explore the possibility of setting up a printer manufacturing unit in India.

HP Asia-Pacific Japan VP (Printing Systems) Leong Han Kong said India is a major growing market for HP and the challenge before the company is to make people in India aware of the mobile printing technology.

"Today, many of print drivers are in-built into smartphone operating system. Many customers today are still not aware. We see mobile printing as a very key focus for us. We think that is a growth driver for the industry. We should expect good growth in India in terms of mobile printing," Leong told PTI.

"We continue to evaluate different manufacturing sites. And clearly, the new government being more active in terms of promoting manufacturing, HP will definitely be very open to it. We continue to monitor the opportunities."

Currently, HP, one of the world's largest computer and peripheral manufacturers, has a research and development facility in India, but does not have a manufacturing one.

Leong said HP has a leading position in printing business in India. "India is a very large and growing market for HP. It's also a market which is very fast growing... We see a lot of potential," he added.

Leong made it clear that the government's initiatives like Digital India, besides e-governance and smart cities, are of "great interest" to HP.

"We think that the innovation, the solution that we have, apply to those initiatives and we can bring good value to some of the programmes that Prime Minister is rolling out across India.

"We are right now working with our India team and partners in India to size up the potential and clearly, we would be very involved in terms of working with the government of India to share a solution," Leong added for good measure.

Talking about the dominant position in both laser and ink printing market share, he remained optimistic about mobile printing -- both business and home -- which he thinks would see a tremendous growth in India and the challenge is to educate people that it's easy to print from smartphones while the customer is on the go.

Modi's flagship 'Digital India' is aimed at connecting citizens electronically for better delivery of government services. Besides, under the 'Make in India' initiative, the government is looking to make India a global manufacturing hub.