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R&M Eyes Tier 3 & 4 Cities in India for Growth In 2020

Murugesan R

The Switzerland based network cabling major R&M (Reichle & De-Massari AG) has ambitious growth plans for the India market for the next one year. To increase its reach across the length and breadth of the country, the company is banking on its network of channel partners. In a conversation with Channel Times, Murugesan R, Senior Director, Sales – Private Networks at R&M India, shares the company’s channel strategies and focuses on growth areas and future plans for 2020.

Key growth areas

Speaking about the key growth areas for the company in India, Murugesan says, “We see a lot of scope in the India market for structured cabling and are heavily investing in the country. Last year, we’d set up a large manufacturing facility in Bangalore. Around 300 employees including technical staff and management are working in R&M India.”

The cabling giant is actively involved in the India government’s smart city projects. As Murugesan says, “We supply passive infrastructure to smart cities.” He explains that large system integrators (SIs) buy our products and implement smart city projects. So far, 11 smart cities in India have used R&M products.

“We look forward to working with some of the government initiatives like airports and metro modernization projects as well,” he says.

The other area of focus is 5G technology. While globally the 5G is already underway, India too is not far behind. Murugesan mentions that Indian telecom service providers have already started redesigning its network infrastructure to address the 5G boom. The need for more bandwidth and low latency has pushed the country towards fiber optics.

“Our role becomes prominent in this context as fiber optics plays a key role in making the nation 5G ready. We have OEM fiber, which can address the 5G speed requirements,” informs Murugesan. Not disclosing names, he says that currently, a telecom giant in India is using its products for making their infrastructure 5G ready.

“In order to meet the 5G demands, R&M is investing heavily in fiber-optic cable and key fiber accessories are getting manufactured in strategic locations across the world. We spend close to 4% of our revenue in our R&D for meeting the future-proof product ranges and requirements. This preparation will assist us in dealing with the evolving 5G requirements for the Indian market,” he says.

In addition to the fiber and telecom product lines, the company is planning to produce copper cabling products, informs Murugesan.

Products in the pipeline

On the company’s new product offerings, Murugesan says, “R&M has been in the cabling industry for decades and has put forth a lot of innovation in developing high-quality cabling products. Cat 8.1 cables and Netscale 72 are the latest addition to our repertoire. In the coming year, with the support of our strong R&D team, we are planning to launch Netscale 120.”

According to him, “The team at R&M has been working relentlessly in order to better meet the growing needs of our customers and to enhance our product line. Our solutions are used by network operators in all industry verticals including data centers, airports, smart cities, hospitals, educational institutions and more. With the high level of product quality and innovative design system, we ensure that the networks are future-proof and investments are secure for the long term.

The channel play

Speaking on the channel initiatives, Murugesan says that R&M has a simplified channel partner model in place that comprises select national distributors and regional distributors who work in tandem to efficiently distribute its products across the country.

The company has recently tied up with Ingram Micro as its national distributor to strengthen its business by making products readily available across India.

“We currently have two national distributors and eight regional distributors in India. Apart from metro cities, we also have a presence in tier 2 cities like Nagpur, Kochi, Madurai, etc. Besides, we have over 200 partners and SIs across the country for a well-streamlined product delivery and operations,” he explains.

Business and channel roadmap in 2020

As we see a lot of scope in India market for structured cabling, R&M will continue to invest in India to have a higher market share, says Murugesan, adding that fiber could be the most critical infrastructure that we need today, therefore the government tends to increase India’s fiber footprint to 7.5 million fiber kilometer by 2022. Therefore prioritizing and accelerating right ways to ensure quick fiber roll-out is of vital importance to us.

In terms of our channel ecosystem, we are enhancing it by adding more distributors even in tier 3 and tier 4 cities. In the next two quarters we can see the SI partner numbers growing up from 200 to 300 across all small cities.  We are quite strong in tier 1 and tier 2 cities and by 2020, we can ensure that R&M will have presence in almost all the smaller cities across the country.

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