Acer lays UK cards on the table

Looking to further expand its market position in Europe, Acer has vowed to gain business in the UK.

"We are increasing our marketing efforts and expanding our corporate sales team in the UK," Walter Deppeler, senior corporate vice president for Acer and vice president for Acer EMEA, told vnunet.com at the CeBIT trade show.

Acer sells through retail stores and channel partners exclusively. The expansion of the corporate sales team is designed to benefit the sales through channel partners.

Acer is the third largest computer manufacturer of Europe. It is number one in the laptop segment and number five in desktop systems, according to data by IDC. The UK is one of Acer's weaker performing markets.

The company has a strong focus on the enterprise and home office markets, and launched new laptop computers at CeBIT that it hopes will specifically appeal to users in those markets.

The Aspire 5000 and 5020 series feature the newly released AMD Turion 64-bit mobile processor, extended battery life and enhanced security.

Acer's market is also served by Dell, but the latter has a direct sales model and Acer an indirect one. Acer has historically taken market share away from Toshiba and HP, according to Deppeler.

He added that the company has no plans to step up its sales efforts towards HP customers now that there is confusion about the future of HP's PC and laptop division.