According to www.thehindubusinessline.com, Rajat Vohra, CEO of Redington India, stated that domestic manufacturing is shielding the company’s IT supply chain from geopolitical stress — with vendor lead times rising only from 6–8 weeks to 10–12 weeks, and cloud and services now accounting for over 20% of its India business.
Geopolitical resilience via local manufacturing
Vohra emphasized that geopolitical disruptions have had limited impact on Redington India’s operations because most of its vendor partners maintain domestic manufacturing facilities in India. While import lead times extended, the broader challenge stems from AI-driven memory price surges: average selling prices (ASP) across mobile phones, PCs, servers, and networking equipment rose 30–50%. This has led to softened unit demand in certain device categories — though value growth persists due to higher ASPs.
“The impact of geopolitics has been limited in India since most of the vendors that we distribute for have a domestic manufacturing presence,”
“As for the imports, the lead times have gone up from about 6–8 weeks to 10–12 weeks but that has been fairly manageable.” — Rajat Vohra, CEO of Redington India
Strategic pivot to ecosystem orchestrator
Redington India is transitioning from a traditional hardware distributor to an “ecosystem orchestrator.” Cloud and services now contribute more than 20% of its India revenue. The company has partnered with more than 40 AI-focused Independent Software Vendors (ISVs) and reports strong penetration across its AI PC portfolio. Approximately 30% of its business is fully digital — enabled by platforms supporting end-to-end solution design and procurement, augmented by human support where needed.
Vohra noted:
“We started off as a distributor but are now transitioning ourselves to an ‘ecosystem orchestrator’. Cloud and services contribute more than 20 per cent of our India business today…” — Rajat Vohra, CEO of Redington India
Premium smartphone demand and festive outlook
Redington operates primarily in the premium smartphone segment — defined as devices priced above $600. Despite ASP increases, the company expects to protect unit volumes and achieve 15–20% revenue growth ahead of the Indian festive season. Entry-level segments, however, may experience deferred purchases and volume declines. Enterprise infrastructure demand remains robust, even as device consumption weakens slightly on a unit basis.
“We primarily operate in the premium segment of above $600, which has shown strong growth… Overall, despite the flattish volumes we expect revenue growth of 15–20 per cent,” Vohra said.
Expansion into Tier-3 and Tier-4 cities
Tier-3 and Tier-4 cities are strategic priorities for Redington India, with plans to expand into 41 such markets this year. Lower real estate costs and improved talent availability are accelerating tech ecosystem development in these locations. Demand is largely driven by SMEs — many without dedicated IT departments — yet increasingly seeking AI, connectivity, and infrastructure solutions.
Data centre capacity tailwinds
Industry estimates project an 8x increase in India’s data centre capacity over the next 3–5 years. Redington is targeting power and cooling solutions, GPU servers, networking infrastructure, and deployment/operations services. It has also formed co-location partnerships with data centre providers to offer capacity to SMBs through its channel network — shifting from pure hardware supply to collaborative capacity delivery.
“We see a humongous opportunity in this space… We have also collaborated with some co-location data centre providers to offer capacity to SMBs through our channel network,” Vohra added.
Source: thehindubusinessline.com
Compiled from international media by the SCI.AI editorial team.
