Oscar forays into mobile handset market; to invest Rs 100 cr

Consumer goods manufacturer Oscar today forayed into the highly-competitive mobile handset market with 10 devices and will invest Rs 100 crore on marketing this year.
“We will invest Rs 100 crore this year on our product and marketing. By the end of first year, we hope to sell one lakh mobiles per month in North and East India with a turnover of Rs 250 crores,” Oscar Group Executive Director Suresh Wadhwani said.
Oscar has priced its products between Rs 1,700 to Rs 4,500.
Initially, Oscar will work with manufacturers in China and source its products from there but will set up a unit in the country once it achieves 1 lakh units per month in sales.
Oscar, which manufacturers colour televisions, home theatre systems, DVDs, and multi-media speaker systems is the latest entrant in the Rs 70,000-crore handset market in India.
Of the overall handset market, about 50 per cent is cornered by the ultra-low cost handsets.
The segment has witnessed at least one new mobile vendor every month.
These new home grown entrants such as Micromax, Lava, Wynn Telecom, Lemon, Zen, Olive telecom are giving tough competition to well entrenched players ? Nokia, Samsung and Sony Ericsson.