PRESS: Govt may grant sellers 1 bln rbl/yr for natl devices ads

MOSCOW, Aug 18 (PRIME) -- The Russian government, large retailers, and local electronics manufacturers are discussing a 1 billion ruble per year subsidy to compensate the sellers’ costs of national devices advertisements to improve brand awareness, business daily Kommersant reported on Thursday.

A government source told the daily that the Digital Development Ministry with producers, such as Aquarius, Yadro, and ICL, and retailers, such as M.Video and DNS, were holding talks to start sales of national devices, mainly tablets, laptops, and system units.

“The large chains showed interest to the sale of Russian electronics, but they need state support to promote the brands. The consumer should be motivated at least to get familiarized with the national products,” the source said.

According to preliminary calculations, it will need about 1 billion rubles per year.

At present, the country’s producers do not target individuals, only companies and the government.

The electronics producers said that in addition to the marketing support they need cheap loans to manufacture large batches of devices that still cannot compete with foreign analogues by price.

(60.7552 rubles – U.S. $1)

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