PC Science sweeps into Asda supermarkets

PC Science has notched up the lucrative Asda contract and will supply the supermarket giant with hardware for a year.

Asda has signed a deal with the Yorkshire company to supply PCs to 115 Asda stores from 1 March. PC Science will also train 200 Asda staff to sell the entry-level machine at its training centre in York.

An Asda representative said: 'We are putting PCs from PC Science into stores. It will mean we are offering one of the cheapest 400MHz machines available in the UK.'

Charles Forsyth, managing director of PC Science, added: 'PC Science will put between 5,000 and 6,000 PCs into Asda stores by the end of March.

It will be a very aggressive deal. Our manufacturing facility has a 50,000 capacity, so we are hungry for business.'

PC Science will also provide technical support for the Celeron 400MHz machines within the #599 price tag. Two further models, a Pentium 400MHz for #799 and an AMD K6 notebook for #999, can be ordered in-store, but will be delivered direct from PC Science.

This is Asda's third attempt at supplying PCs. The first was with Viglen, which was followed by a Future Solutions and Memsolve partnership. Memsolve's crash into administration prevented the contract being renegotiated.

Pete Day, senior analyst at Inteco, said: 'Most of the supermarkets are getting in on PC sales. It has been proved that it works.'

He added: 'Although the UK sales model is moving towards the French and German one, there is still not enough volume from supermarkets to substantially alter the channel structure. Asda using a less known brand is a risk, but it's the bundle and value that people will look at.'

Tesco claimed that it was the first retailer in the world to have PCs with the latest Pentium III processors on its shelves.