Dell is a company very close to the top of the computer hardware and system integration industry and while the first place is still firmly in the hands of HP, Dell is not so far behind either. Just like most hardware manufacturers and vendors, Dell is always looking for a new piece of market, preferably a market in full expansion that can increase the company's business opportunities and revenues.

It looks like such a market in full bloom is the hardware market in India and Dell would not be the first company to invest heavily on the Indian market as just last week the laptop manufacturer Lenovo announced that it will soon open an assembly plant in India in Baddi, northern India.

Dell announced that its latest production plant just begun its work in Sriperumbudur, India and that its output will be aimed at the blooming Indian PC market according to the news site InfoWorld. The initial production capacity of the new Indian facility will be of 400 000 desktop units per year and will rise gradually, as Dell plans to invest another $30 million over the next five years. The new desktop manufacturing facility is located in southern India, near Chennai and raises to three the number of production plants that Dell owns in Asia. The Dell company has several other projects to expand its production facilities around the world, as the work started earlier this year at a plant in Brazil and another one that is nearly completed in Poland and is scheduled to open later this year.

A market report from the IDC research firm shows that the Indian computer market is growing quite fast, exceeding five million units sold last year and with a solid 25 percent increase year-on-year in unit shipments. Among the other hardware manufacturing companies that have production capabilities in India there's the giant HP that runs two such plants located in Bangalore (southern India) and in Uttaranchal (Uttaranchal). HP's production facilities are new too and according to a HP spokesperson, the Bangalore one has a nominal production capacity of 75,000 units a year, while the other one, that started production in March, is much bigger with a top production of 500,000 units per year.