Intex raises growth bar

Intex Technologies, a leading homegrown smartphone manufacturer with a market share of over 10 per cent, may invest Rs 300 crore towards promotional programmes of its mobile phones and other products, aiming to double revenues to Rs 8,000 crore this fiscal.

The company also roped in Tollywood actor G Mahesh Babu as its brand ambassador for Andhra Pradesh and Telangana, aiming to reach sales of Rs 1,500 crore in South India. The region contributes 18 per cent to the revenues of Intex.

Mahesh Babu on Monday launched Intex Aqua Trend — a 4G-enabled smartphone, armed with Android OS Lollipop 5.1 and a 1.3-GHz quadcore processor — priced at Rs 9,444.The competitively priced phone comes with a 3,000 mAh battery, one-year screen breakage warranty, and hot-knot sharing system.

Addressing reporters, the actor said that he, as a brand ambassador for Intex for a period of two years, will be seen on the company’s TV commercials, besides several brand activities.

He recently shot a Telugu commercial for Intex. “The new Aqua Trend has the best battery life among its competitors, and is very competitively priced. I will be using Aqua Trend as my smartphone here onwards,” he added.

According to Intex Director Keshav Bansal, the company has set a target of 15 million smartphone sales this financial year. Intex believes that association with Mahesh Babu will help it reach new targets. Intex has already roped in Kannada actor Sudeep as its brand ambassador in Karnataka.

The company has four manufacturing facilities and expects to roll out smartphones from its Greater Noida plant in the next three to four months. The capacity of the plant would be 3.5 to 4 million handsets per month, Bansal explained.

“We are a zero-debt company till date,” he said, when asked about the investments required to achieve the targeted Rs 8,000 crore turnover from mobile business this financial year.