Barco Projection Systems Case Study
INDIAN INSTITUTE OF MANAGEMENT INDOREMARKETING MANAGEMENT 1GMPE, Batch 4Prof. Jayasimha K RAssignment Submission: Case AnalysisBARCO PROJECTION SYSTEMSBy: Vishal Bharani, GMPE, Batch 430/06/2018Barco Projection Systems (A): Worldwide Niche Marketing| Case AnalysisIntroduction: In the early 1989, BPS or Barco Projection Systems was leading the projector market, with the highest scanning rate, which is the benchmark set by them only, which made them one of the top players in this industry. Meanwhile in late 1989 Sony introduced the Sony 1270, which was both superior product in terms of performance and price as compared to the Barco’s BG400 which was the market leader at that time. BPS had limited time, about 3 months, to develop their strategy and new product and display it at the next trade show, Infocomm. While they had several projects in the pipeline, only one, the BG800, would be able to beat Sony’s product in terms of performance, thus allowing them to regain their market leadership. However this product requires major developments and had only 40% chance of making to Infocomm in the given time crunch.
The Market:In 1989 the projector market was quite competitive and the prices of the projectors were solely decided upon the scanning rate of the projector. The projectors were also divided into different categories based on their scanning rates.Projectors fell into three different categories: Video, Data, and Graphic. The chart below compares them under various heads:-Video ProjectorsLow scanning rates: upto 16 kHzComparitively low prices.Highest Market Share: 63%Lowest Predicted annual growth: 0.8%Data ProjectorsModerate scanning rates: 16 kHz to 45 kHzComparitively moderate prices.Moderate Market Share: 33%Moderate Predicted annual growth: 12.3%Graphics ProjectorsHigh scanning rates: 16 kHz to 64 kHzComparitively high prices.Least Market Share: 4%Highest Predicted annual growth: 40.2%Thus from above table it is evident that the best future scope lies in Graphics projectors.Competition:There are 4 main players in the projector industry: BPS, Sony, Electrohome and NEC. Sony had the highest market share at 45% with BPS at second position with 25%. Sony did not have any product in Graphics Projectors and it was dominated by BPS followed by Electrohome. Sony had the best distribution channel with over 1500 dealers across the globe. BPS and Electrohome had similar distribution channel with nearly 45 distributors and 100 dealers worldwide. NEC did not had strong distribution channel and relied on General Electric for part of their sales. BPS’s dealers were divided into 2 categories- Box and System. Box dealers did not provide any installation service or post sales service, whereas System dealers did both. Here Barco has an advantage. Since the Data and Graphics are the most emerging markets, Barco is ready with their fleet of system dealers (which is nearly 80% of their total dealer count) to provide services and installation for these technologically advanced projectors.