Wires and Cables: Factors Influencing Behaviour

In current market scenario electrical wire & cable market is very competitive. Number of branded as well as unbranded players is available in this competitive market. The Indian wire & cable industry is predominantly volume driven. Wire & cable market in India comprises nearly 40% of the electrical industry. In the current era of competitive market branded wire and CoS adopted various marketing strategies such as market penetration, new product development, promotion strategy. Wire & cable industry is being shifted from unorganized sector to organized sector. Quality and technical parameters with reputed brands play a dynamic role in determining demand of various products. Marketing strategies needs to be adopted continuously after studying various parameters such as customer expectations & perceptions into accounts.

Wire & cable market

The wires & cables industry in India has come a long way, growing from being a small industry to a very large one, over the past decade. Although the industry comes with a lot of technical and quality nuances, it is mostly volume driven. Over the last 20 years, the industry has shifted from being an unorganised sector to an organised one, Still 35% of the industry continues to be a part of unorganised sector. Increasing demand for power, light, communication has kept demand high for wire & cable. Wires & cables market in India comprises nearly 40% of the electrical industry. According to industry experts, it is expected to double in size in the next 5 years. Market is growing at a CAGR of 15% as a result of growth in the power and infra segments.

As imp as it is to use good quality copper, there are various disadvantages and serious consequences of using untested copper for wiring as per the table. Relative specification values measured of wires using Electrolytic Tough Pitch Copper vis-à-vis Scrap Refined (Commercial) Copper (for 1sq mm wire) The test results (on the next page) amply prove that wires with commercial copper are not only inferior in physical properties but are also alarmingly low on electrical parameters such as conductivity. It is proved further that high level of impurities has resulted in a steep increase in resistance by as much as 88%. This obviously explains almost twice the temperature rise as compared to ETP copper since higher resistance  causes higher loss resulting in heat. ICA India therefore strongly recommends that all concerned such as, consultants, contractors, electricians etc. should consider use of ISI certified copper wires only.

India’s economy and the planning of the govt to increase the development activities in the area of power, telecom and real estate, may accelerate the growth rate in the sector of wire & cable.

• Product Profile: Wire & cable sector is classified as per the requirement of the end user, such as power cable, wire & cable for electrical equipment, winding wire, exposed wire, communication cable and wire & cable accessories. Presently, global market of insulated wire & cable consists of electric conductors up to 1000 volts with 70.60% of the global demand and the remaining proportion of 29.40% is comprised co-axial cable and co-axial electric conductor, electrical conductors more than 1000 volts, insulated winding wire of copper, optical fibre cables and other insulated winding wire.
• Competitive Scenario: Wire & cable industry is organised in nature due to the availability of limited number of market players. There are approximately 65% organised players and 35% unorganised players in Wire & cable sector. Due to the tough competition from the countries like China, Brazil, South Africa and Saudi Arabia, Indian wire & cable companies lack a competitive edge in the international market. The quality and variety of wire & cable with its applications in different industries make it demanding in several countries.
• Resource Risk: The raw materials that are being used in the manufacturing of wire & cable are copper and aluminium as conductive material and plastic and rubber for insulation. Despite the fact that India has abundant reserves of metals, the raw material availability of copper and aluminium is the biggest challenge faced by the sector players. The rising price of raw materials is a big threat to stable price and production costs in wire & cable. The rising price of aluminium and copper is becoming a major issue as it has squeezed the profit margin of enterprises. Internationally, most countries usually opt variable pricing structures where certain fluctuations in the prices of raw materials automatically get adjusted in the prices of finished products. But in India, enterprises execute orders on fixed prices, so the varying prices of raw materials hit the manufacturers directly. The import dependency of Wire & cable sector in India is high as the mining of minerals to get the copper and aluminium for the manufacturing of wire & cable requires legal permissions and, because of environment protection, the permission is granted up to a certain limit. Therefore, the sector has high risk of foreign-market fluctuations on its production as it is directly related to the import of raw material.

Industry Scenario

The industry has graduated from being dominated by unorganized sector players to the branded and quality players with national repute. Although wire & cable industry in India is largely volume driven, quality and technical parameters with reputed brands play a dynamic role in determining demand of various products. Wire & cable market in India has come a long way, from being a small industry to a very large one, over the past decade. The industry is mostly volume driven, although it comes with a lot of technical and quality nuances. Over the last 20 years, the industry has shifted from being an unorganized sector to an organized one, although 35% of the industry continues to be a part of the unorganized sector.

Wire & cables market in India comprised of nearly 40% of the electrical industry. According to metal world research team, “it is expected to double in size in the next five years. The industry is growing at a compound annual growth rate of 15% as a result of growth in the power and infra segments”. Indian wire & cable industry is predominantly volume driven. In the power cables arena, the HV & EHV cable industry witnessed growth mainly due to acceleration in implementation of ongoing projects in the pipeline. In addition to this, demand for HV & EHV cables is steadily rising in densely populated metro cities, where installation of overhead transmission towers is expensive as well as hazardous.

Wire & cable make up the delivery for electricity in our home. Running the main breaker panel or fuse box to outlets, appliances and fixtures indoors and out, wire & cable must be sized and installed appropriately to keep electricity running through our home. Electrical wire has obvious uses, such as the delivery of power across country and through our home. While the terms wire & cable are often used interchangeably, technically wire is one electrical conductor and cable is group of conductors, or wires encased in sheathing. Due to increasing demand from retail consumers, on rapid urbanization and development of rural markets this wire & cable market is growing very rapidly.

Consumer Behaviour

The term Consumer Behavior refers to the study of how individuals make decisions to spend their available resources on consumption related items. Studying customers provide clues for developing new products, product features, prices, channels, messages, and other marketing-mix elements.

Consumer Behavior refers to the behavior that consumers display in searching for, purchasing, using, evaluating and disposing of products and services that they expect will satisfy their needs. Study of Consumer Behavior is the study of how individuals make decisions to spend their available resources like time, money and effort on consumption related items. In order to survive and grow the Org. has to delight the customers. Consumers will be delighted if they get more than what they expect. Study of consumer behavior helps in knowing their expectations and the sacrifices they are ready to make in order to fulfill those expectations. Study of consumer behavior assumes that consumers are actors in the market place. Consumers play various roles in the market place. Starting from info provider to consumer, from user to payer and to disposer, consumers play roles in the decision process. Different people play different roles in different stages of purchase. A purchaser or customer may not be the same person for example a person who purchases a product for the family may not be the consumer of the product.

Factors influencing Consumer Behaviour

The consumer decision process explains the internal process as well as individual behavior for making product or service decisions. The consumption process is influenced byexternal factors like cultural, social, personal, and psychological factors.

• Influence of Cultural Factors: Culture, subculture, social class are particularly imp in buying behavior.
• Culture: Culture is the fundamental determinant of a person’s wants and behavior. Culture refers to the traditions, taboos, values and basic attitudes of the whole society within whichan individual lives.
• Social Class: Social class refers to the hierarchical arrangements of the society into various divisions,each of which signifies social status or standing. Social class is an important determinant of consumer behavior as it affects consumption patterns, lifestyle, media patterns, activities and interests of the consumers.
• Reference Groups: An individual’s attitude, value and behavior are influenced by different groups. Thesegroups are called reference groups and they have direct or indirect influence on the individual. Buying behavior of consumers is largely influenced by the reference group to which they belong or aspire to belong.

Govt initiatives to boost cable industry in India

In India we have cable manufacturing industry mainly in 2 segments: Organized & Unorganized. In the organized sector cables are produced with best / virgin raw materials as per specification, are duly tested during production at various stages and the final product is retested before dispatch. This makes the products from the Organised sector more expensive than Unorganised sector. Cable Industry in the Unorganised sector is mainly in House building wiring industry, where no quality control is followed. The main reason being that the end user is also not aware of all quality req’s. However the situation is changing. With the slew of advertising and the publicity campaigns targeted at this segment, people are getting more and more aware about the quality of products in this category too and asking questions before deciding on the cables and wiring. This is a step in the right direction, since the safety & durability of electrical & electronic fixtures depends on these. Advertising is a positive step for our industry. But as you must have noticed, the primary focus is towards house Wires & not towards Cables which are an Industrial product.

The industry which has been growing at the rate of around 15% currently will start growing at over 20% over the next 5 years. Wires & cables industry in India has come a long way, growing from being a small industry to a very large one, over the past decade. The increasing demand for power, light, communication has kept demand high for wire & cable. This trend will continue as demand for reliable, efficient energy and data communications will strengthen Wires & cables industry in the future as well. Over the last 20 years, the industry has shifted from being an unorganised sector to an organised one. Still, 35% of the industry continues to be a part of the unorganised sector. In India, the size of the cable manufacturing industry is approximately Rs 40k Crs.India is one of the biggest consumers of electric energy after the US and China. Accelerated urbanization and growing concern over pollution have increased the investment in metro rails for urban mass transportation.

In current market scenario electrical wire & cable market is very competitive. Number of branded as well as unbranded players is available in this competitive market. The Indian wire & cable industry is predominantly volume driven. Wire & cable market in India comprises nearly 40% of the electrical industry. In the current era of competitive market branded wire and CoS adopted various marketing strategies such as market penetration, new product development, promotion strategy. Wire & cable industry is being shifted from unorganized sector to organized sector. Quality and technical parameters with reputed brands play a dynamic role in determining demand of various products. Marketing strategies needs to be adopted continuously after studying various parameters such as customer expectations & perceptions into accounts.

Wire & cable market

The wires & cables industry in India has come a long way, growing from being a small industry to a very large one, over the past decade. Although the industry comes with a lot of technical and quality nuances, it is mostly volume driven. Over the last 20 years, the industry has shifted from being an unorganised sector to an organised one, Still 35% of the industry continues to be a part of unorganised sector. Increasing demand for power, light, communication has kept demand high for wire & cable. Wires & cables market in India comprises nearly 40% of the electrical industry. According to industry experts, it is expected to double in size in the next 5 years. Market is growing at a CAGR of 15% as a result of growth in the power and infra segments.

As imp as it is to use good quality copper, there are various disadvantages and serious consequences of using untested copper for wiring as per the table. Relative specification values measured of wires using Electrolytic Tough Pitch Copper vis-à-vis Scrap Refined (Commercial) Copper (for 1sq mm wire) The test results (on the next page) amply prove that wires with commercial copper are not only inferior in physical properties but are also alarmingly low on electrical parameters such as conductivity. It is proved further that high level of impurities has resulted in a steep increase in resistance by as much as 88%. This obviously explains almost twice the temperature rise as compared to ETP copper since higher resistance  causes higher loss resulting in heat. ICA India therefore strongly recommends that all concerned such as, consultants, contractors, electricians etc. should consider use of ISI certified copper wires only.

India’s economy and the planning of the govt to increase the development activities in the area of power, telecom and real estate, may accelerate the growth rate in the sector of wire & cable.

Product Profile: Wire & cable sector is classified as per the requirement of the end user, such as power cable, wire & cable for electrical equipment, winding wire, exposed wire, communication cable and wire & cable accessories. Presently, global market of insulated wire & cable consists of electric conductors up to 1000 volts with 70.60% of the global demand and the remaining proportion of 29.40% is comprised co-axial cable and co-axial electric conductor, electrical conductors more than 1000 volts, insulated winding wire of copper, optical fibre cables and other insulated winding wire.

Competitive Scenario: Wire & cable industry is organised in nature due to the availability of limited number of market players. There are approximately 65% organised players and 35% unorganised players in Wire & cable sector. Due to the tough competition from the countries like China, Brazil, South Africa and Saudi Arabia, Indian wire & cable companies lack a competitive edge in the international market. The quality and variety of wire & cable with its applications in different industries make it demanding in several countries.

• Resource Risk: The raw materials that are being used in the manufacturing of wire & cable are copper and aluminium as conductive material and plastic and rubber for insulation. Despite the fact that India has abundant reserves of metals, the raw material availability of copper and aluminium is the biggest challenge faced by the sector players. The rising price of raw materials is a big threat to stable price and production costs in wire & cable. The rising price of aluminium and copper is becoming a major issue as it has squeezed the profit margin of enterprises. Internationally, most countries usually opt variable pricing structures where certain fluctuations in the prices of raw materials automatically get adjusted in the prices of finished products. But in India, enterprises execute orders on fixed prices, so the varying prices of raw materials hit the manufacturers directly. The import dependency of Wire & cable sector in India is high as the mining of minerals to get the copper and aluminium for the manufacturing of wire & cable requires legal permissions and, because of environment protection, the permission is granted up to a certain limit. Therefore, the sector has high risk of foreign-market fluctuations on its production as it is directly related to the import of raw material.

Industry Scenario

The industry has graduated from being dominated by unorganized sector players to the branded and quality players with national repute. Although wire & cable industry in India is largely volume driven, quality and technical parameters with reputed brands play a dynamic role in determining demand of various products. Wire & cable market in India has come a long way, from being a small industry to a very large one, over the past decade. The industry is mostly volume driven, although it comes with a lot of technical and quality nuances. Over the last 20 years, the industry has shifted from being an unorganized sector to an organized one, although 35% of the industry continues to be a part of the unorganized sector.

Wire & cables market in India comprised of nearly 40% of the electrical industry. According to metal world research team, “it is expected to double in size in the next five years. The industry is growing at a compound annual growth rate of 15% as a result of growth in the power and infra segments”. Indian wire & cable industry is predominantly volume driven. In the power cables arena, the HV & EHV cable industry witnessed growth mainly due to acceleration in implementation of ongoing projects in the pipeline. In addition to this, demand for HV & EHV cables is steadily rising in densely populated metro cities, where installation of overhead transmission towers is expensive as well as hazardous.

Wire & cable make up the delivery for electricity in our home. Running the main breaker panel or fuse box to outlets, appliances and fixtures indoors and out, wire & cable must be sized and installed appropriately to keep electricity running through our home. Electrical wire has obvious uses, such as the delivery of power across country and through our home. While the terms wire & cable are often used interchangeably, technically wire is one electrical conductor and cable is group of conductors, or wires encased in sheathing. Due to increasing demand from retail consumers, on rapid urbanization and development of rural markets this wire & cable market is growing very rapidly.

Consumer Behaviour

The term Consumer Behavior refers to the study of how individuals make decisions to spend their available resources on consumption related items. Studying customers provide clues for developing new products, product features, prices, channels, messages, and other marketing-mix elements.

Consumer Behavior refers to the behavior that consumers display in searching for, purchasing, using, evaluating and disposing of products and services that they expect will satisfy their needs. Study of Consumer Behavior is the study of how individuals make decisions to spend their available resources like time, money and effort on consumption related items. In order to survive and grow the Org. has to delight the customers. Consumers will be delighted if they get more than what they expect. Study of consumer behavior helps in knowing their expectations and the sacrifices they are ready to make in order to fulfill those expectations. Study of consumer behavior assumes that consumers are actors in the market place. Consumers play various roles in the market place. Starting from info provider to consumer, from user to payer and to disposer, consumers play roles in the decision process. Different people play different roles in different stages of purchase. A purchaser or customer may not be the same person for example a person who purchases a product for the family may not be the consumer of the product.

Factors influencing Consumer Behaviour

The consumer decision process explains the internal process as well as individual behavior for making product or service decisions. The consumption process is influenced byexternal factors like cultural, social, personal, and psychological factors.

Influence of Cultural Factors: Culture, subculture, social class are particularly imp in buying behavior.

• Culture: Culture is the fundamental determinant of a person’s wants and behavior. Culture refers to the traditions, taboos, values and basic attitudes of the whole society within whichan individual lives.
• Social Class: Social class refers to the hierarchical arrangements of the society into various divisions,each of which signifies social status or standing. Social class is an important determinant of consumer behavior as it affects consumption patterns, lifestyle, media patterns, activities and interests of the consumers.
• Reference Groups: An individual’s attitude, value and behavior are influenced by different groups. Thesegroups are called reference groups and they have direct or indirect influence on the individual. Buying behavior of consumers is largely influenced by the reference group to which they belong or aspire to belong.

Govt initiatives to boost cable industry in India

In India we have cable manufacturing industry mainly in 2 segments: Organized & Unorganized. In the organized sector cables are produced with best / virgin raw materials as per specification, are duly tested during production at various stages and the final product is retested before dispatch. This makes the products from the Organised sector more expensive than Unorganised sector. Cable Industry in the Unorganised sector is mainly in House building wiring industry, where no quality control is followed. The main reason being that the end user is also not aware of all quality req’s. However the situation is changing. With the slew of advertising and the publicity campaigns targeted at this segment, people are getting more and more aware about the quality of products in this category too and asking questions before deciding on the cables and wiring. This is a step in the right direction, since the safety & durability of electrical & electronic fixtures depends on these. Advertising is a positive step for our industry. But as you must have noticed, the primary focus is towards house Wires & not towards Cables which are an Industrial product.

The industry which has been growing at the rate of around 15% currently will start growing at over 20% over the next 5 years. Wires & cables industry in India has come a long way, growing from being a small industry to a very large one, over the past decade. The increasing demand for power, light, communication has kept demand high for wire & cable. This trend will continue as demand for reliable, efficient energy and data communications will strengthen Wires & cables industry in the future as well. Over the last 20 years, the industry has shifted from being an unorganised sector to an organised one. Still, 35% of the industry continues to be a part of the unorganised sector. In India, the size of the cable manufacturing industry is approximately Rs 40k Crs.India is one of the biggest consumers of electric energy after the US and China. Accelerated urbanization and growing concern over pollution have increased the investment in metro rails for urban mass transportation.