The Hindu Business Line : Zenith Computers unveils new PC platforms

Small footprint: Ms Devita Saraf, Executive Director, Zenith, and Mr Raj Saraf, Managing Director, at the beach side launch of the SmartStyle PC in Goa last week. —

Anand Parthasarathy

Recently in Salcette (Goa) A slow but subtle stress on the corporate side of its business was perceptible at the beach-side unveiling last week of Zenith Computers’ game plan and product offerings for the year ahead.

The company has hardly strayed from its single-minded focus on personal computer products for over 17 years, says founder-Managing Director Mr Raj Saraf.

To strengthen its bond with loyal customers, the company has launched a new customer service commitment called ‘Always On’ which assures corporate users round-the-clock after-sales service for 365 days of the year, across 350 country-wide centres with an onsite service option even for laptops.

For home and retail customers, the promise is all-days service including Sundays.

Design ingenuity

In an industry where true innovation is well nigh impossible — almost every PC runs the same software and uses the same processor and graphics hardware — Zenith’s Mumbai-based engineers have shown product design ingenuity in their latest offering, the SmartStyle PC, by squeezing what is normally the CPU tower into the casing of the 17-inch LCD-TFT display.

The standard Intel dual core-fuelled machine comes with 80 GB of hard disk storage and 1 GB of memory in its basic Rs 20,000 configuration.

However, engineers at Zenith’s ISO 9000/14,000 factory at Sancoale, Goa near the Dabolim airport told Business Line that there was enough space to add more memory, an optical DVD drive and as much hard disk storage as would become available in the 2.5 inch form factor for portable computers.

The Executive Director, Ms Devita Saraf, explained that compelling attraction of the SmartStyle PC was two-fold: Its versatile 180 degree mounting hinges allowed the monitor-CPU unit to be placed on a table, hung flush on the wall or integrated into a table top surface.

“Banks and hotels which are short of space can find many creative ways of deploying it,” she added.

Home users

For home users too, the PC with the addition of a TV tuner for around Rs 2,000 will double as a wall-hung bedroom TV cum Internet access device. The keyboard and mouse can be made wireless with the addition of a wireless ‘dongle’. The other plus point was that the PC was fuelled by a mobile version of the Intel dual core processor — thereby reducing the overall power requirement to almost a third of similar-specification desktop avatars.

Other Zenith hardware launches this month include the Vu Boss PC — where the CPU unit is fitted into a hand-sized 1.3 kg package that can be snapped on to the back of any monitor.

Ms Saraf also revealed that in a small departure for what was hitherto a hard-core (pun intended!) player, Zenith will soon offer in foreign, mainly American, markets its IT infrastructure management tool, SAAS — System Application and Administration Software — which is already serving a number of enterprise customers in India.

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