Interview of Ronald Poon: Senior Manager of Canon Singapore

Roland Poon is a Senior Manager at Canon Singapore. He has been working in the company for many years and he works at the product marketing department for image communications products division for South and South East Asia. He recently visited Bangladesh and visited BCB ICT WORLD 2009. He gave a speech there in the program arranged by J.A.N. Associates Ltd. He was also present in the discussion program titled “EOS New Technology” at Dhaka Sheraton Hotel and there, he gave an interview on 19 November 2009. Here is the interview for the readers:

 

Razib Ahmed: How Long have you been working for Canon?

Roland Poon: I am basically from Canon Singapore, Canon’s South East Asian regional headquarter. I have been working for Canon for the past twenty three years. So, for me, I would like to share Canon’s latest technology of with Bangladeshi photographers so that they do not only buy a camera but also know what is inside the camera.

Razib Ahmed: You have been visiting Bangladesh for quite some times. What is the biggest difference you see when you first came to Bangladesh and now, especially about Canon?

Roland Poon: Yes, I have come to Bangladesh many times. Firs time when I came to Bangladesh, I was in the engineering department to set up the service. Then I was transferred to the marketing department. Since then I have been visiting Bangladesh mainly to promote our products.

Well, there has been a major change in Bangladesh. The first time when I came to Bangladesh there was not so much traffic but this time it is really very different. There are many Toyotas on the road. I also found out that many Bangladeshi photographers are using our high-end products. So I am glad that people in Bangladesh have already gone up to this stage. That is why we need to come to Bangladesh continuously to share our experience.

Razib Ahmed: In the morning I saw that you had a workshop in J.A.N.  Associates. How was the response?

Roland Poon: We had actually two workshops, yesterday and today for the photographers whether they are Canon or Nikon users.  

We had a very good response. Especially, today. We answered all the questions both technical and usage. So, as I said, this is a very good experience to share our technology and skills with the people of Bangladesh.

Razib Ahmed: Since you cover South East Asia from Singapore, how would you evaluate the performance of J.A.N. Associates compared to other countries?

Roland Poon: As far as I know from my experience in marketing side, J.A.N.  Associates is doing a great job in Bangladesh. They have doing very good with printer business but now they have already included imaging products like cameras and scanners and they are doing very well.

Razib Ahmed: How is your market share in Bangladesh?

Roland Poon: Again, our market share in overall Asia including Bangladesh has grown tremendously over the years. We are doing better compared to our competitors and our market share in Asia has grown about 50%.

Razib Ahmed: In digital SLR camera?

Roland Poon: Yes, in digital SLR camera. I take care of the digital SLR camera’s promotion, supporting, marketing events like this etc.

Razib Ahmed: Can you tell us a little bit about your service and support in Bangladesh because you do not have direct office here?

Roland Poon: We have a distributor, J.A.N.  Associates. They are doing very well. Earlier, I mentioned that they invested over twenty thousand dollars in equipment and they have engineers who were sent to Singapore for training. The last time when I came I remember we have engaged our engineers to come from Singapore and work with J.A.N.  Associate in CMOS training. We are here to educate them and share our experience with them.

Razib Ahmed: What are the potentials of your products in Bangladesh? Do you think dSLR cameras can grow in the next five years?

Roland Poon: I think so. Next year, we going out to promote our dSLR products more aggressively and increase our products. So, I think there is a huge potential. So far, the seminars we attended we observed a steady growth of sales of Canon products in Bangladesh and there is still room for growth. We would want to know people about our service and support and we would also like to share our knowledge and skill in future.

Razib Ahmed: So when are you coming to Bangladesh next time?

Roland Poon: Most probably early next year. I mean in the first or second quarter next year. We  are planning to do better workshops, seminars where we would like to discuss about indoor shooting and model shooting and printing. As you know Canon has got both input and output devices- input like cameras, output like printers. So, it blends very well. We would like to show people how easy and funny it is to take photos and print them.

Razib Ahmed: Do you have any suggestion for J.A.N.  Associates?

Roland Poon: They have lot of room for growth but the most important is the support from the people. I know that they have very good marketing strategies and work very hard to sell products but at the same time they would also have to focus on after sales service which is also very important to retain our market shares in Bangladesh.