India’s PC market has been steady for the past few quarters, a significant change in enthusiasm from the highs of a couple of years ago. The global shipment trends are no different. Finding a niche is important, which will spur the next stage of growth, according to Chitranshu Mahant, who is the co-founder of Primebook, an Indian tech company that is building Android based education focused laptops for students and educational institutions. Mahant believes Windows machines cannot match their cost versus experience advantage they offer, whereas Chromebooks are an uncomfortable fit within India’s education landscape.
One thing Mahant and I agree on is that tablets are great content consumption devices, but for many use cases (and that includes serious education flows), a tablet with a keyboard is simply a compromise. Multi-tasking isn’t the same as it on a laptop, neither is the mobile-first web browser as capable as you’d get on a desktop computing platform. Mahant’s Primebook is now focusing on a value-added services layer to sell alongside the Primebook laptops, the next generation of which is nevertheless expected this festive season. There are ed tech subscription bundles on the agenda, as well as an AI layer including summarisation of education videos. Edited excerpts.
Q. As the PC market slows down, where would the next growth areas be for PC makers?
Chitranshu Mahant: This space is more or less stagnating. Considering that India is a price sensitive market in search of value for money, I would have expected the below ₹20,000 segment should have gained the same sort of popularity, just as it has with Android smartphones.
Prices are very critical for whoever is buying, and in that perspective, we must decide how the PC market is actually functioning. For now, most mid-range and premium laptops and PC are for professional usage. It started in early 2000s when laptops and PCs became critical for professionals, like you and I. We cannot imagine a life without a PC. But next wave, I believe, will be led by students. Just like how PCs become critical for professionals, they are now becoming critical for students. For a student’s education focused perspective, we believe that Microsoft Windows is still designed as a professional first operating system. You have all the tools and software for pros.
For most students, their ecosystem is built around Android, because they either have an Android phone or tablet to fulfil their computing device needs as of today. Very few have laptops. There is another segment of Google Chromebooks, right, which is still a relatively new kind of device for students. While the Chromebook’s Chrome OS makes for a very good device, but in terms of market fit, it is still a product geared for the western markets where the education ecosystem is built around web browser-based services. A Chromebook fits there, because it is a browser first machine.
The next boom should be from laptops priced under ₹20,000, just like the Chromebook. The focus area should be an Android laptop for students, not a browser first laptop, nor a Windows’ productivity focused laptop or even a tablet which I believe is largely a content consumption device, not for productivity or education. At least if the students are serious about it.
Q. Would you say the momentum of the last couple of years has finally been lost?
CM: It is mostly cyclical. You can consider a four-year cycle before people start replacing their laptops or desktops. Consider this, among the total laptop sales for example, as many as 95% of that market is relying on today’s professionals in the business to business (B2B) and business to consumer (B2C) segments. In 2015 as well, there was a peak. Then the shipment numbers kept going down. Computing devices for education, still a niche, is growing at as much as 8%.
Q. What exactly is the Primebook proposition and which audience would appreciate the benefits of this focused approach?
CM: This design keeping in mind student as a user. For example, the whole Android ecosystem in a laptop may not be ideal for professionals but because you have Android, there is more value for money at the ₹15,000 price point. There is better performance compared with a ₹20,000 Windows laptop. That really is the basic premise.
How we have built this is, we have broken this into different education segments. There is the product stack, the hardware stack and the OS stack. As a next step, we are building what we call value added services. and now third step we are building, we call it value added services. For standard 9th and below, we have begun introducing Prime Secure, which is a parental control app for parents and it’s very easy to use. One click, and you child’s laptop is secured.
We are now readying a marketplace within the existing system. What we realised after a survey of Primebook users is that more than 70% of them have an education subscription on an app or platform. After buying a device or owning a device, students buy a subscription The idea is to build a tech marketplace for Primebook users, where they can subscribe to the popular platforms, at a better price.
On top of it we are building 1 AI layer specifically from a student’s point of view. It’s very much in the initial stages, but I can share that our AI chatbot within Prime OS would be like a high school teacher. We come from that perspective, just as in terms of tools. What we have begun to introduce, and it should be available to all users in another month, is AI summary. Basically, any video lecture you are watching Primebook, the feature can create a summary of it with a single click.
We are at a stage within the company with around 50,000 Primebook users, where we can start experimenting with what is working and what isn’t. It’ll help us build more tools.
Q. Will the AI layer be monetised?
CM: We don’t know, to be honest. We are thinking ₹99 a year, but we haven’t finalised yet. From a company perspective, this value-added service stack is going to help bring in more margin in the business. The hardware stack is a first step, a single sale transaction business. Our customer is going to be us with us for three years or so. We are thinking of building some software products in the value-added service tech that we can upsell. Our base model is based on OpenAI’s models, and we will be enabling more AI within the OS.
Q. How is the product and update roadmap sharping up, and are there plans to build on this with a wider portfolio of Primebook laptops appealing to different users and use cases?
CM: It’s very clear that a growing PC market is because of students. We think we have foud a fit in India, and within emerging market. We will not go beyond the student focused products. Our positioning is clear, our vision is clear, that we want to be first choice of laptop for students. That’s what we are aiming for in terms of product road map. There is a complete journey, both in hardware and with software. We intend to launch the Primebook Generation 2 during the Diwali season. It’ll have an all-metal body, because that’s something we learnt from user feedback. bamboo generation 2 during the valley it will be all metal body. We want those students to feel aspirational, even if it cuts down our margin a bit. It’ll also have the 4G SIM option. Right now, the Prime OS is based on Android 11, but the next generation Prime OS will be based on Android 14.
