By Kim Yoo-chul
Staff Reporter
South Korea's Daewoo Electronics has just entered the growing local system air-conditioner market, where bigger rivals LG Electronics and Samsung Electronics have been enjoying dominance.
Daewoo Tuesday released a new lineup of ``Klasse’’ system air-conditioners featuring highly energy-efficient technology and said it would offer ``rental services’’ to help consumers purchase the appliances with two year split contracts.
``We believe demand for system coolers will steadily rise here thanks to the revised fire protection law,’’ Lee Seung-chang, the company’s chief executive, said in a press conference in southern Seoul. ``We will increase our local market share to 15 percent by 2010 riding on soaring consumer appetite.’’
In 2005, the South Korean government revised the fire protection law to set 150 millimeters as a mandatory gap between floors to install spring coolers in residential-commercial buildings, fueling growth momentum for the segment.
According to governmental sources, as many as 270,000 households out of some 440,000 units of newly provided apartments will be subject to the revised law this year.
LG Electronics and Samsung Electronics dominate 80 percent of the local market. Experts say the market will grow at an annual rate of 20 percent to reach 1.5 million units by 2010 from an estimated 900,000 units in 2007.
On a question about the company’s ongoing talks with Morgan Stanley over stake sales, Lee declined to elaborate, saying he is not in a position to comment on the issue.
Morgan Stanley has been chosen as the preferred bidder to buy a controlling stake in Daewoo Electronics. Daewoo had been placed under a debt rescheduling program after its parent group collapsed in 1999 due to huge debts.