COMMSCOPE SEES SLOWDOWN IN CABLE MARKET

US cable manufacturer CommScope's India operations have been hit by a wave of piracy from local cable manufacturers. According to CommScope territory manager (operations) Gurdeep Singh Bakshi, some Indian companies have been importing cable from China and selling them as CommScope products.

"The market has been flooded with low quality brands such as TriScope which are being passed off as CommScope core supplied to Trilogy. A lot of Chinese cable is being sold as our product. Then a Rajasthan-based company Comscope has been selling the Mega brand which people think is our product because of the manufacturing firm's name," says Bakshi. "A Mumbai-based company is selling spurious Alcatel coaxial cable when Alcatel has stopped making the product. We are proceeding with legal action against these companies."

Bakshi, however, says that the reason for the slowdown is not simply because of piracy but because of delayed shipments into the country. "Our containers were held up and we had no cable to supply during the World Cup when everyone was buying cable," he says. "The spurious guys, cheap Chinese imports and Indian manufacturers had a gala time then."

Because of these constraints, CommScope is not expecting a spurt in its sales this year. The Indian coaxial cable market is estimated to be worth $70 million per annum of which imported brands account for $8 million. CommScope has an estimated 67 per cent share of the imported cable market and a 7.15 per cent share of the overall cable market. "We hope to maintain our sales level at last year's levels but our share of the imported segment will fall because of the amount of cheap Chinese cable that is coming in to the country," says Bakshi.