Acer targets US$30 bil. sales by 2011

The revenue target means Acer will have to boost computer sales by 15 percent a year, Gianfranco Lanci, president of the Taipei-based company, said at a press conference in Budapest yesterday. Notebook sales will have to grow by 35 percent, he said.

Acer, which bought three smaller rivals in the past year to boost its share in European and American markets, plans to take market share from larger competitors Hewlett-Packard Co. and Dell Inc. Acer will position Packard-Bell to serve high-end customers in Europe, and will push its Gateway brand to style-conscious customers in the U.S. and Asia, Lanci said.

“The difference between Packard-Bell and Gateway will be the geographic position,” Lanci said. “In terms of brand position, it’s the same.”

The Taiwan company will push its own Acer PC brand in all markets for customers who care more about being “in control” than “in style,” he said. Acer acquired Irvine, California-based Gateway Inc. for US$755 million last year, and bought Packard-Bell BV for 31 million euros (US$44 million) in January.

The PC industry will probably continue to consolidate as competition puts pressure on profit margins, Lanci said. Acer’s 2011 revenue goal doesn’t include possible acquisitions, he said.

“It’s based on the current setup, in terms of brands,” he said.

Emerging markets will probably drive growth, Lanci said. China probably has the biggest growth potential, as Acer is already the top PC seller in Russia and is the number three in India, he said.

Acer wants to sell mobile computers through telecommunications companies, company Vice President Gianpiero Morbello said in an interview after the press conference. It signed a deal with Deutsche Telekom AG’s T-Mobile wireless unit, which will start reselling Acer’s Aspire One notebook for one euro in November to users signing up for a 24 month mobile data transmission contract, the German company said yesterday.

“In Italy, we are already discussing with other telcos,” he said. “It’s a new channel, a new way.”

Acer plans to sell about 6 million Aspire One units this year, and “a good percentage” will be through telecommunications companies, Morbello said.

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