Hartcourt Penetrates Notebook Distribution Market Through Leading Consumer Electronic Mega-Store
Monday March 21, 6:30 am ET
SHANGHAI, CHINA--(MARKET WIRE)--Mar 21, 2005 -- The Hartcourt Companies, Inc. (OTC BB:HRCT.OB - News) (Frankfurt:
900009) today announced that Hartcourt, through its operating subsidiary, has successfully launched notebook computer sales in Yongle (
www.yongle.com.cn), a leading consumer electronic mega-store in China.
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In the fast-evolving consumer electronic market in China, consumers are rapidly shifting their shopping preferences to mega-stores, similar to those of Best Buy in the North America, away from independent retailers in the once popular PC malls. To capture this new spending trend, Huaqing, a unit of Hartcourt, bundled Samsung notebook with China Unicom's wireless Internet card as a package deal to sell in the 38 mega-stores of Yongle Electronics in Shanghai, a city with more than 20 million in population. The package deal comes with consumer financing in the form of monthly installment payments, making the purchase of a notebook more affordable to the average Chinese consumers. While consumer financing is well developed and widely used in the Western counties, it is a relatively new marketing and financing tool in China.
Since Hartcourt launched its bundled notebook sales on December 20, 2004, in Yongle, Samsung notebook sales quickly rose to account for approximately 20% of store revenues in the notebook category in the first two months of 2005. Hartcourt management believes that the key factors to the success of the sales campaign are the bundling of products from two well-known name brands and selling them through a leading consumer retail chain, in addition to the attractive pricing and monthly installment payment plan available. Samsung is not only a world consumer electronic giant but a market leader in China as well. China Unicom (
www.chinaunicom.com.cn) is the fourth-largest telecom operator in China, specializing in the mobile phone market as well as call and data communication and other value added telecom services. Hartcourt, through its operating subsidiary, is a key sales and marketing partner of Samsung notebook and monitors with exclusive distribution rights in Shanghai.
Mr. Li Zheng Zheng, General Manager of Hartcourt subsidiary Huaqing, said, "We are very proud in initiating this innovative sales program. We will forge similar partnerships with other leading consumer electronic retailers in this vast Shanghai market to multiply our success story. We will continue to find creative ways to increase our market share, deepen the sales penetration and at the same time reduce our distribution cost."
About Hartcourt
Hartcourt is an investment and management company that conducts its business in China's IT industry. Further information regarding its operations can be found on its web site:
www.hartcourt.com