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Country Trading Plc, sole importer and distributor
of AKIRA TV sets, is to become the second company to
assemble televisions locally. The company has
installed an assembly plant in Nifas Silk Lafto
District on a 35,000sqm plot around Hana Mariam.
At a ceremony held at Ghion Hotel last Monday,
Benyam Berhane, major shareholder and managing
director of Country Trading, disclosed that the
assembly plant would lower the current prices of
AKIRA TV sets by 20-25pc.
The 14-inch AKIRA TV currently goes for 1,190 Br
while the 34-inch model is tagged at 6,990 Br in
AKIRA distribution shops.
Established 15 years ago by Benyam and his mother,
Amelesha G. Selassie, Country Trading imports
beverages, electronics and machineries while it
exports agricultural goods and manufactured
products. It has projected to spend 30 million Br
for this venture.
The pioneer in the business of assembling
televisions is United Tebarek & Families Plc, which
began assembling Vestel TV sets nine years ago. The
company has now cut production by half, according to
its major shareholder, Tebarek Mume, assembling 50
TV sets daily.
“We deliberately cut our production in a bid to
switch our line to Liquid Crystal Display (LCD) TV
sets from our current Cathode Ray Tube (CRT) TV
models,” says Tebarek. “The state-of-the art LCD
technologies are increasingly demanded for their
size and image quality.”
Joan Tay Hoon Boon, senior sales executive of TT
international who was the invited guest at the
ceremony, said that last year Country Trading was
able to double sales of AKIRA products.
Ms. Boon told Fortune Ethiopia was chosen for
AKIRA product assembly for its cheap labour and
available land.
When the local assembly plant goes operational, it
is expected to create job opportunities for 1,500
people.
According to Benyam, 90pc of the construction work
has been completed and machineries have been
imported from the Singapore-based, TT International
Limited.
TT International was incorporated in 1984 as TT
Importers and Exporters Pte Ltd and later changed
its name to TT International Limited. With its
warehouse lying on 450,000sqft, the company supplies
AKIRA brand electronics to emerging economies
worldwide.
Daniel Berhane, commercial manager of Country
Trading, told Fortune the company plans to
export the TVs to East African addition to
supplying the local market.
As of 2002, TV penetration in Ethiopia was 10 per
1,000 people, and only 2.8pc of households had
access to television.
AKIRA an international Global brand, which was
launched 1994, has been sold in 60 countries across
the globe.
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