David Versus Goliath

While there currently is not any one technology giving white-box builders the upper hand, their ability to build customised boxes to order gives them another advantage over multinationals. This has forced multinationals to improve their definition of Build Your Own beyond merely letting buyers choose the size of their monitor and hard drive, says Sony Vaio business manager Gordon Kerr.

Sony is a major component supplier to Australia’s white-box builders, who can then reconfigure their offerings very quickly to meet customer demands, Kerr says."The build-toorder facility is definitely being pushed in branded companies like Acer so much more in Australia, ahead of some other areas, specifically because of Australia’s build-to-order white-box market," he says.

"We’re now working on our Vaio models for five months from now.We’re locking that in now but the specs we’re talking about you could get today if you went to a local assembler, because the components are already available."

Ingram Micro is another long time supplier of components to local white-box builders and it has watched white-box and multinational fight for supremacy, says Ingram Micro OEM business manager Danny Kwoh.

"About 10 years ago, anyone that could pick up a screwdriver and build a PC could make a fortune out of it. Then competition got stronger as more people started jumping into the market. Under pressure from tier 1 vendors such as Dell, Acer and HP, the market really got squeezed," Kwoh says.

"As white-box fought back the branded players were forced to become more flexible. In the past you saw labels on HP machines that said if you open the box and update something the warranty is voided. Now they have clauses so you can upgrade if you go to an authorised agent."

Acer’s Mikaelian: Flexibility, service are key strengths

"Australian people feel warm when they walk into a store and someone can help them; we are a very service-orientated country and whitebox meets that need.That’s why, no matter how hard the tier 1 try to push down on this market, while-box still survives."

Acer has been watching the white-box builders closely and recognises their flexibility and customer service as key strengths, says Acer Computer Australia channels general manager Greg Mikaelian.

"We’ve been looking at what the white-box offers customers -- it’s not necessarily price, it’s the ability to be there for customers’ needs, offer flexibility, offer upgrades and offer service," Mikaelian says.

"We looked at why white-box was so successful and, as a result, we really tried to meet customers’ needs and offer them something different, as opposed to 'here’s a branded box from a vendor and that’s all you’re going to get'."