New players keep venturing out in India’s rapidly growing technology landscape. Brands from around the world view the country as an important market, one that can make or break a business. The Hong Kong-based company Nexstgo recently took up the India challenge with its sub-brand, Avita, making its way to this part of the world.
Avita, which is headquarted in the United States and is known for tech products that are “fashion forward”, launched its first ever set of laptops in India earlier this week at an event held at Delhi’s The Leela Palace hotel.
In conversation with Guardian 20, Alex Hau Yeung Chung, CEO and co-founder of Nexstgo, told us about the new “Avita LIBER Series” of laptops. “With Nexstgo, we are bringing next-generation laptops which meet the lifestyle demands and match the working culture of millennials. Avita has launched its stylish first series of laptops—the Avita Liber series—that combines performance with fashion. The laptop comes in spectacular styles, with ultra-thin, all-metal chassis design and an array of vibrant colours and splendid patterns to fit with the customers’ very own style and character,” he said.
These laptops are known for their sleek design. They are also significantly light. The series includes five laptops, each weighing merely 1.37kg and each encased inside a 5mm-wide body. The laptops come in three display sizes—13 inch, 13.3 inch and 14 inch with an FHD (1920×1080) resolution. The 10-hour battery backup is impressive as well. With 8GB RAM and up to 512GB SSD memory, these Windows 10 machines are built to tackle heavy use.
But it’s in the looks department that the Avita LIBER Series truly excels. The laptops are adorned with intricate patterns and attractive colours—from paisley on lilac to flowers on yellow, from iris on ruby to ornament on gold. Avita Prurple, Urban Ruby, Fragrant Lilac and Sun Flower Yellow are among the colour options available.
At the Delhi event, Chung also told us about Nexstgo’s India strategy. “This market is known to be one of the fastest growing ones in the technology segment and is open to embracing new lifestyle brands. We are looking forward to introducing our fashion-forward and high-performance products to Indian consumers. The brand’s philosophy is to allow our customers to express themselves through technology, and we aim to do this with all our products.”
On the specific challenges a new entrant to the Indian tech space might face, Chung said, “When we talk of challenges, we believe the consumer must be aware of the right requirement at the given price range. We have a number of players in the laptop segment and everyone specialises in various tangents. It is the offline market, which consumers mostly tap, and it’s here that they expect the best in class experience of touch and feel. Also, there are many competitors here, and this will make us strive even harder to gain visibility in the eye of the Indian consumer with our regular presence and constant launches in the coming quarters.”
But in a market full of big names, what makes Avita stand out? “Avita,” Chung said, “comes into the market with a unique positioning of ‘fashionable’ and ‘lifestyle’ laptops. We believe a laptop is a necessity for most people but we observed customers just cannot find a laptop which can represent their character or their own style, especially for a big and highly diversified market like India.”
In the near future, the brand intends to introduce more such products and tap into the as-yet neglected area of lifestyle technology. Chung said, “Avita will launch a line-up of accessories to complement every lifestyle. The range includes IOT products—smart scales and smart mirrors, notebook sleeves, notebook backpacks, carrying cases as well as computer peripherals.”
Nexstgo’s Avita clearly has long-term plans for India, and has the whole road map already figured out. According to Chung, “In the near future, we will be covering all the channels across the country. We are already there on all e-commerce platforms like Amazon, Flipkart, Tata Cliq and Paytm. Our products are available through the offline mode in cities like Chennai, Hyderabad, Mumbai, Delhi and Lucknow. We will soon have regional offices in all metro cities. We are planning to bring in some unique products too for Indian customers in the coming quarters and we are working on expanding our offline reach further.”