Chennai, NFAPost: Backed by rolling out of new range of over 100 affordable and premium models of room air conditioners on Monday, Blue Star is targeting to achieve a market share of 15% by FY26 in the room air conditioners segment.
Speaking at a press conference in Chennai, Blue Star Managing Director B Thiagarajan said the market for room ACs is at its inflection point and is poised to grow exponentially over the next few years.
“Industry estimates reckon that the market will more than double by 2030. This represents a huge opportunity for us, having over 80 years of AC expertise and being well-entrenched in the marketplace,” said Blue Star Managing Director B Thiagarajan.
To boost its plans on deeper market penetration, the company is also betting big on enhancing its manufacturing footprint, Blue Star, through its wholly-owned subsidiary Blue Star Climatech has set up a state-of-the-art manufacturing facility in Sri City, Andhra Pradesh which commenced commercial production in January 2023.
In addition, Blue Star’s two plants in Himachal Pradesh are dedicated to manufacturing room ACs. These facilities are well-equipped with the latest automation techniques and tools for assembly lines and material handling, among others, as well as extensively deployed with a host of initiatives towards IoT and digitisation.
With these plants, Blue Star now has a production capacity of over a million room ACs, which will gradually scale up to 1.8 million ACs in due course.
Blue Star Managing Director B Thiagarajan said Blue Star continues to make significant investments in R&D, manufacturing as well as supply chain to enhance competencies and capabilities to leverage the growing demand effectively.
“We anticipate the forthcoming summer season to be strong and expect the demand for room air conditioners to be robust. We are confident that with our formidable battalion of room ACs, cutting across all consumer segments and price points, we will grow faster than the market,” said Blue Star Managing Director B Thiagarajan .
The company continues to make aggressive strides in ecommerce and modern trade channels where it has been a prominent player and plans to sustain its investments in instore demonstrators in retail stores, as this has immensely helped in enhancing offtake.
Besides, it continues to adopt appropriate promotional methods both online and offline, amplifying offtake across all tiers. The company is also strengthening its distribution network, especially in the north.
It now has a network of over 2,100 service centres to reach all markets effectively. It also has a fleet of over 150 service crew vehicles that make reliable aftersales service easily accessible throughout the country.
Blue unveiled its new comprehensive range of room ACs on Monday, including a ‘best-in-class affordable’ range and a ‘flagship premium’ range, for the forthcoming summer season. Overall, the Company has launched over 100 models across the spectrum of inverter, fixed speed, and window ACs, and across price points to cater to every consumer segment.
According to the company. the market for room ACs is witnessing significant demand owing to burgeoning middleclass consumers with higher disposable incomes and the category becoming more of a necessity than a luxury. The company is experiencing demand from first-time buyers, especially in the Tier 2, 3 and 4 markets, as well as the replacement market.
The company has launched three categories in the inverter split AC segment. These include flagship, premium and affordable ranges in 2-star, 3-star, and 5-star variants, which are available in various cooling capacities from 0.8 TR to 2.2 TR at attractive prices starting from Rs 29,990. The new ACs launched are embedded with various customer-friendly features.
These include a new innovative feature called ‘AI Pro’, which is a complex and intuitive algorithm that senses various parameters, adjusts and delivers maximum comfort.
