Trade News we can
Trade News we can identify as the main culprit. Up until September- October of last year, sales were fairly good and in a few countries even very positive, but from the second half of November, sales generally slowed down and have not picked up since. The last months’ sales have been really tough, but it is impossible to identify the reason why. Global trends include such factors as consumer costs for energy (electricity, fuel, etc), which are rising steeply, and are having an impact on consumers every month. This is combined with a rapid decline of average pricing in most of the sectors (CE, IT, Telecom and Imaging), which makes life a little bit more complicated. Where are the sweet spots in terms of product categories? Fortunately, there are some areas where we are doing very well, thanks to the innovations launched by the industry. In the CE world, the connectivity of products is a real eye-opener for the consumer who can use his or her TV as the pivotal device in linking smart-phone, laptop, digital still camera and audio. The sharing of possibilities between these devices is clearly an asset for us. Of course in the IT environment, the tablets are the stars, but we have to acknowledge that this has affected the sales of laptops. Looking at the major domestic appliance market, we have to recognise the renovation that has happened specifically across all kitchen appliances. Because families are spending much more time in their openplan kitchens, the industry has focused on innovations and those products have become very sexy: refrigerators, hobs and hoods are all gems. The steam oven has become the dream of every household right now! It’s a very healthy evolution. By the same token, energy friendly devices (dryers, washing machines, refrigerators) with A++ labels are doing very well. Your presidency is still rather new… How is what you are doing different from your predecessor? The way Euronics’ board is now structured is different from before. Since June 2010, the four countries with the biggest sales volume are automatically represented on our board of directors. Four other board members are elected by the General Assembly, which also elects the president with a majority vote system: for each 5% of weight in the volume of Euronics’ turnover, a country gets an extra vote. Therefore, Germany has five votes, Italy, France, the UK & Spain each get three votes, and the other 24 countries get one vote. But, my candidacy for president was based on continuity, and it would be pointless changing major aspects of the company because we are THE DEAL MAKERS A Japanese importer and distributor of Apple peripherals tells us about his IFA experience… Pleiades System Design, Japan Mikio Motohashi, President Which product has impressed you the most at the show so far? Mobee Technology's Magic Numpad. The Mobee Magic Numpad transforms the Apple Magic Trackpad into a customisable numeric keypad. It’s innovative. I have never seen anything like it. How important is IFA for you? Very important. I am sure that a lot of new companies in Europe are making innovative products – I would like to meet them at IFA. a successful enterprise. And, despite being the youngest buying group in Europe, we also became the strongest in turnover. Therefore we should not change too much, and the things that have been changed are more about finetuning our internal structure in order to improve efficiency and effectiveness. Hall 23 Stand 102 ADVERTORIAL 42
The Diary of Miss IFA Behind the Scenes at IFA "Since 2001 Miss IFA supports the global awareness of the leading consumer electronics trade show IFA. Emerged as a virtual character, this young woman with bright red hair is since 2005 a real and worldwide known representative of the IFA with high recognition value." Dirk Koslowski, IFA Senior Executive Manager. ‘‘ Hello! Miss IFA here with the first of my live diaries for IFA 2011. Just like last year, I’ll be talking about what I’ve been up to day by day. And of course, today being Day One of the IFA press days, for the last three days I’ve been to a lot of press conferences and seen a lot of amazing products… Here we go! The IFA opening press conference was packed with media from all over the world including TV news channels, print journalists and tech bloggers. Siemens has been the company that opens the three days of non-stop press conferences for quite a few years now. Behind me you can see Siemens CEO Roland Hagenbucher just about to start his speech. Here is Dr. Rainer Hecker, Chairman of the Supervisory Board of gfu giving his customary welcoming address in the Media Centre on Wednesday. This is one of the key opening events every year at IFA. On my way from one conference to another I spent a few minutes with the IFA International news team, telling them what I had been doing so far and what to expect from me for the diary. Richard Barnes Editor-in-Chief (left), Gary Smith Journalist (right). At the opening press conference of IFA 2011, I listened to the speeches with Dr Alexander Pett, Managing Director of gfu on my right, IFA's Dirk Koslowski next to him. Anyway… now I have to go to another press conference, but I'll be back tomorrow with more news from the front line... ‘‘ www.ifa-international.org IFA International • Friday 2 nd September 2011 43
