How China’s Xgimi plans to make a dent in India’s highly competitive smart projector market | Interview
Xgimi made its India debut in March 2020, just a few weeks before a nationwide lockdown in response to the COVID-19 outbreak, would bring everything to a grinding halt. It was not the best of times to start a business, especially one where even established players have had a difficult time maintaining steady momentum thanks to the onslaught of feature-rich affordable smart televisions making projectors a relatively pricier proposition –seemingly—meant for a more niche audience. The perception, though, is changing. More people are warming up to projectors, understanding their merits. Cost of ownership has also come down owing to brands, including Xgimi, launching more affordable options.
In an exclusive interview with Financial Express Online’s Saurabh Singh, official Xgimi India representative Sushil Motwani, tells us how the brand plans to make a dent in India’s highly competitive smart projector market, its product roadmap, after-sales, and tech support and more. Excerpts.
— Xgimi—the story so far?
The journey of Xgimi in India has been absolutely fantastic. We launched the products in the first week of March 2020, faced lockdown soon after, started again in June and the graph has been going up since then. Among our major milestones is that we now have a distributor network in some of the major cities in India. We have Xgimi experience centres in Mumbai, Pune, Delhi, Bangalore, and more are coming up in Hyderabad, Gujarat, and Kerala. Our focus is going to remain on DTC (Direct to Customers) experience. Our sales indicate that this category is growing, and we have sold over 2,000 units in less than 18 months. This is quite a good number for a new entrant in a market packed with established competitors. During the lockdown, we remained focused on making consumers aware of their options in home entertainment. This strategy worked because, at that time, people wanted to relive the big screen experience in their living rooms and our products fitted the bill.
— How are you building awareness about the brand? How has the response been so far?
From March 2020 till now, we have been concentrating mainly on advertising across social media platforms like Facebook, Instagram, Google, and YouTube. We have recently started advertising on the Amazon Marketplace to sell directly to the consumer. Since November 2021, pandemic restrictions nationwide have been reduced, so we are planning to organise more brand-awareness events. We are also participating in a lot of exhibitions to spread more brand awareness and encourage people to tangibly experience the products. Positive word-of-mouth by the customers who own an Xgimi product has helped us tremendously in sales.
— How do you see the success metrics of the brand so far since launch?
From selling about five pieces in the first month to over 200 pieces being sold every month, the journey has been fantastic. We soon want to reach the 500 mark. The success metric of the brand is very encouraging. We have added more experience centres in major cities. We are also tying up with retail partners in Hyderabad and Gujarat to reach out to more customers.
— What is the main USP of Xgimi? What sets you apart from the competition?
Earlier, the main USP was the Android operating system but now other brands have also joined the bandwagon. Also, other brands mostly have a third-party tie-up for after-sales services. This is where we are setting ourselves apart from others. Our main USP is that we have our own Mumbai-based service centre, and we have specific ways to handle any issue with our products. We first try to solve a problem with a phone call. If that doesn’t work, we follow up with a video call. And then engage via remote access and if that doesn’t work, we get the product picked up by Blue Dart from anywhere in India, bring it to our service centre, fix the issue, and send it back to the customer. Free pickup is arranged by the brand itself if the product is under the warranty period. After the warranty period also, we offer them the same service, but it is chargeable. This personalised customer service is our main USP, and we are trying to up our game by offering a much better experience than what other brands promise to provide. By talking directly to the customers and with the help of extensive research, we have understood where the gaps are, and we bridge them effortlessly. Our turnaround time is just 72 hours to repair any product.
All our projectors come with an inbuilt TV grade chip so watching content on our projector is just like watching smart TV, only the picture will be much clearer, sharper, crisper than any other brand in India.
— Could you elaborate on your business model in India? Is Xgimi available online or offline or both?
The business model of Xgimi is more focused on DTC (Direct to Customer) experience and customers can also buy the Xgimi projector online on our website XGIMIindia.com or on Amazon India. We are now teaming up with smart stores where people can scan QR codes to get all information on the product before they place their order. The customer will be able to track their package as well. And of course, there are also our experience centres where they can understand the product thoroughly.
— What kind of after-sales service support do you provide to the customer? Is there a tech support service available and where?
We are available round the clock and the first escalation as of now goes to the director of the company. We then pass it on to the concerned department. The Xgimi team is a nationwide force whose only job is to follow up on the complaints and close them after efficient troubleshooting. Customers get very anxious if something goes wrong with a very expensive product and if they face an issue that they can’t fix on their own. That is where we come in and patiently work with them till the issue is resolved with the perfect solution.
— Being a relatively new brand, what are the challenges you are trying to overcome?
We have not faced any major challenges because we have been constantly working on improving our brand and make our customer experience better. Yes, we are aware that people are very apprehensive about a few things when it comes to Xgimi. It is a Chinese brand and is a relatively new entrant. Consumers wonder about quality and warranty and also don’t really know how projectors can augment home entertainment.
We are addressing all these concerns by spreading awareness about the brand, offering additional warranty, and most importantly, making the customer comfortable by showing that we can be trusted. The fact that our products sell on their own merit is half the job done and the other half is approached via brand outreach.
— What are your thoughts on the import duty levied on electronic products in India?
The import duty as of today is 10%. And there is an additional CESS, but the biggest issue is that the customer feels uncomfortable with the 28% GST. Anyone who wants to buy our products is comparing the costs to the prices in the United States. The United States has got an 8% tax, whereas here, the price automatically goes 28% higher and this entire money including the duty and the CESS is going to the Government of India, not us. This additional cost is being passed on to the customer. If the GST was not this high, we would have sold double the quantity that we have sold in 18 months.
— What are your future plans?
We are launching multiple smart flagship stores and kiosks in malls to help boost sales all across India. We are eagerly looking forward to rolling out these plans once the current surge in the pandemic subsides. Our target markets will be Mumbai, Pune, Bangalore, Delhi, Chennai, and cities in Kerala. We are getting a very good response from these zones. In the time to come, Xgimi will also be focusing on penetrating the market even more with a portable 4K laser (with built-in Android TV) projector. This is the next segment we want to explore.