Thai Samsung to sell direct to dealers
The Nation (8 October 2007)
Thai Samsung Electronics (TSE) will distribute mobile phones directly to dealers following exclusive distributor SAM's termination of its contract. TSE senior manager Manatase Annawat said yesterday that as part of the company's revised marketing strategy, the sales force had been beefed up and products would be promoted more using the modern trade channel.
TSE has its work cut out for itself to achieve its sales target this year but has no plan to appoint a new exclusive distributor soon, he said. Managing director Kwang Kee-park said Samsung had raised its sales target for this quarter to 150,000 phones per month from the average of 100,000 units, and would in-troduce 10 models by year-end. The Korean company ran into legal problems last month when SAM sued Park and TSE general manager Chung Jun-kim for fraud. Police arrested both executives on September 7 at the company's office on Sathorn Road in the afternoon and released them later on bail. One of the charges against Park is that he asked SAM to purchase a new lot of handsets and said his company would later return money to SAM in the form of a marketing budget of US$1 million (Bt34.3 million). However, SAM claims it has yet to receive the money as promised. SAM eventually notified TSE that it would end its distribution service for TSE. Park yesterday denied any management change at TSE after the legal dispute with SAM. Manatase said TSE had prepared a legal defence and filing a counter-lawsuit was one option. No decision has yet been made, however. He claimed that TSE had already paid 97 per cent of the Bt4 million worth of incentives it would provide to dealers as a show of its commitment and as encouragement to promote its products.
The Nation (8 October 2007)
Thai Samsung Electronics (TSE) will distribute mobile phones directly to dealers following exclusive distributor SAM's termination of its contract. TSE senior manager Manatase Annawat said yesterday that as part of the company's revised marketing strategy, the sales force had been beefed up and products would be promoted more using the modern trade channel.
TSE has its work cut out for itself to achieve its sales target this year but has no plan to appoint a new exclusive distributor soon, he said. Managing director Kwang Kee-park said Samsung had raised its sales target for this quarter to 150,000 phones per month from the average of 100,000 units, and would in-troduce 10 models by year-end. The Korean company ran into legal problems last month when SAM sued Park and TSE general manager Chung Jun-kim for fraud. Police arrested both executives on September 7 at the company's office on Sathorn Road in the afternoon and released them later on bail. One of the charges against Park is that he asked SAM to purchase a new lot of handsets and said his company would later return money to SAM in the form of a marketing budget of US$1 million (Bt34.3 million). However, SAM claims it has yet to receive the money as promised. SAM eventually notified TSE that it would end its distribution service for TSE. Park yesterday denied any management change at TSE after the legal dispute with SAM. Manatase said TSE had prepared a legal defence and filing a counter-lawsuit was one option. No decision has yet been made, however. He claimed that TSE had already paid 97 per cent of the Bt4 million worth of incentives it would provide to dealers as a show of its commitment and as encouragement to promote its products.
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