The Hindu Business Line : That’s her Vu

Visitors walking into computer manufacturer Zenith’s corporate offices in Mumbai are likely to mistake the diminutive 27-year-old in smart threads as yet another upwardly mobile management graduate. Devita Saraf is that, and also the CEO of Vu Technologies, a young electronics and consumer durables company competing with the big guys such as Sony, LG and Samsung.

She specialises in designing and developing hi-tech gadgets for folk who find fulfilment for their every need — music, socialising or entertainment — on their screens, be it TV, mobile phone or computer!

So, while the others fight for a share of the estimated 6-lakh unit market for LCDs in 2009, Devita has upped the ante and launched Intelligent TV, a product that allows you to mail, tweet, scrap, poke, download or surf using a wireless keyboard. So you could be watching a daytime soap or a sports channel and simultaneously download favourite MP3 music and movies, or tune into a popular You Tube video, or text while flipping channels, or play games, or even do all of these using the screen’s picture-in-picture application.

“Selling a television is no longer about the flatness of your product or the price or your dominant share in the marketplace. It is about getting out there with products that continuously exceed the expectations of the buyer and complement his/her lifestyle. At Vu, that is the mantra: keep predicting what the consumer wants,” says this self-confessed gadget freak. Her brand, Vu (pronounced ‘view’) has set out to marry technology to luxury and design, she adds.

Shaping a brand

Daughter of Raj Saraf, chairman and managing director of Zenith Computers, Devita is no stranger to the world of luxury or technology. With a degree in business administration from the University of Southern California, Los Angeles, where she specialised in marketing, she quite symbolises the have-it-will-flaunt-it generation and is not shy of declaring her fondness for luxury brands such as Dior, Prada, Valentino, Giorgio Armani and Chanel.

She had started off as the marketing head of Zenith Computers but soon the desire to do something on her own took hold of her. In 2005, Zenith picked up stake in Vu technologies, a small California-based new product development firm specialising in hi-tech products.

This move came about after Devita visited several innovation labs, including MIT’s media lab and the IDEO in California, and she became convinced that there was a growing market for high-end tech products in India. In 2006, Vu Technologies India launched its first exclusive store selling high-end computers, LCDs and digital homes. In addition to Vu branded systems and displays, the store boasted a ‘Gadget bar’ stocking the latest in luxury technology.

Luxury in demand

Her easy familiarity with luxury brands helps her better understand the expectations of buyers in this segment, she says.

“For me, buying into Vu made sense because the markets there are saturated while we are a big market with a huge appetite for all things new and luxurious,” she explains. She also sensed that the Indian television market had a wide open gap between the high-end products from multinationals and scores of “bad Chinese brands”.

The company currently has five stores, in Mumbai, Pune, Chennai, Hyderabad and Ahmedabad. But with the economic slowdown, she says there is more focus on planned growth and operational efficiencies to sustain profits. “Our numbers are good.

All the bad news around us, including the recession and the terror attacks, means that more families prefer to be home and don’t mind investing a little extra on a good product,” she reasons.

Referring to her company launching the largest television in the market, a fully imported 55-inch model priced approximately Rs 2.5 lakh, Devita says, “You will be surprised at the number of people who want to spend on a product that complements their lifestyle and suits the décor of their home.”

Simultaneously, the company is targeting the corporate segment for its digital signages and already has customers such as Tata Motors, Tata Power, Microsoft, Siemens, Cipla, the Ministry of Defence, Taj group of hotels, Le Meridien and Trident Hotels. Its range of intelligent display devices such as touch-screens and kiosks has found buyers in the banking sector, including State Bank of India, Citibank and HSBC Bank. “For us this is perfect because, as a segment, corporates continuously push us to innovate more on products, so we can find solutions to their nagging operational problems. Getting an order from a corporate client is time-consuming, but once they sign up their purchase values are much higher and they are likely to keep coming back to you with more requirements.”

In her quest for business she is equally at ease at technology trade fairs as with meeting middle-level railway officials. “With malls, airports, hotels and banks mushrooming everywhere and customer service emerging as the most important factor in business, these kiosks and touch-screens offer a way to stay in touch with the consumer,” she says.

Winning new ways

Commenting on the big-ticket advertising wars in television sales, with companies vying for bigger market shares, Devita says she prefers to chart her own course. “Market shares are soon going to be a redundant indication of healthy business. Big advertising budgets merely eat into your profits. Companies that create their own markets, with product innovation as the core, are the ones that will create profits and survive in the long run.” And when she is not busy growing her business, Devita is either brainstorming at FICCI, where she is an executive committee member, or indulging in hobbies — jewellery design, ikebana and dancing.

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