HP has allocated its highest marketing budget for the past few years in an attempt to retain leadership in the highly competitive laser printer market.
According to Thitaphon Boonprasit, Marketing Development Manager, Laserjet Printer & Enterprise solution of Hewlett-Packard (Thailand), this marketing budget boost has been spurred by tough competition from more than 10 other brands which are aggressively pricing their entry-point prices.
Last year, HP retained its number one share of the overall laser printer market at 29 percent, although the gap had narrowed from 2008, when HP enjoyed a 41 percent share.
This is because in the second quarter of last year, the company changed its supply chain process, leading to a product shipment shortage at the same time as its competitors played the price war.
As well as the increase in marketing budget, the company also plans to introduce seven new models, and it will move aggressively in managed printed services to the education, government and manufacturing sectors - areas on which spending had been frozen in the past few years.
The company expects to grow its unit sales by 15 percent in 2010, ahead of overall industry figures which anticipates a growth of 5 to 7 percent from 2009.
