Late last year CDN surveyed its readers to find out the state of the IT/CE convergence in the Canadian channel More than 2,300 readers took part in the survey, which asked seven detailed questions about consumer electronics products, partnerships and market acceptance. The majority of the readers polled are IT resellers.
We wanted to find if they carry CE products. The answer is yes. Slightly more than 36 per cent of respondents are currently offering consumer electronics products.
The most popular CE products carried by IT resellers should not be surprise: home networking products. Media centre PCs are next on the list. Both products fall into what can be called the CE/IT crossover market segment.
Compelling finding
The most compelling findings of the survey was in the partnership section of the study. A little over 29 per cent of the readers have worked with a professional audio-visual reseller, while more than 50 per cent are considering partnering with a professional audio-visual reseller for a CE installation or smart home integration.
What this indicates is that the CE/IT convergence will continue, and will grow at a rapid rate.
About 33 per cent of the respondents have been carrying CE products for just over a year, according to the results.
However, more than 35 per cent see their company expanding into consumer electronics in the next 12 months.
Kevin Baggs, the general manager of Synnex Canada’s CE division, called NEXCE, believes the reason for this is that there are more margin to be made reselling CE products than traditional IT products.
The product areas of growth pointed out by the survey respondents are media centre PCs and large screen TVs.
