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SINCE THE APRIL OUSTER OF ITS OVEREXtended chief executive, Eckhard Pfeiffer, Houston-based Compaq Computer Corp. has not been full of cheer. But its Latin American division is another story. According to research firm Dataquest, Compaq recently racked up the best results among PC makers in the region, with shipments up 46% in the second quarter and its market share ballooning to 23.6%, versus 8.7% for its next closest competitor, IBM. Enrique Ospina, the company's Colombia-born, 47-year-old vice president and general manager for Latin America, recently chatted with LATIN TRADE Contributing Editor Claire Poole about how he plans to keep growing.

What segments will you target?

Market penetration at the home level is fairly small compared to the U.S., so we feel we have a very interesting opportunity in the consumer arena. In the enterprise segment, we see a lot of opportunity in the telco industry, which is booming, e-business and finance. And for the small and medium-sized business segment, we have a line of products called Prosignia that we will be launching.

How is Compaq going to expand in e-commerce?

We actually have e-stores in most of the big important countries, covering 85% of the region's markets. The first one was in Mexico. We have close to US$6 million in annual sales coming from the Mexico e-store. That's still fairly small, but we have been growing that at 100% every month.

So what are your e-sales over the whole region?

They're close to $10 million. But we believe by the end of 2000, we should be close to, if not higher than, $200 million.

Have resellers been upset with your e-commerce efforts?

In some cases, they have voiced some concerns. We will be selling a lot of value-added products on the site, and a lot of those are clearly going to be offered by our channel partners, distributors and resellers.

Is Compaq going to take part in free and almost-free PC campaigns in Latin America?

We don't discard that. Usually, what's behind the free PC concept is some sort of revenue stream in terms of Internet offerings. We are in conversations with some companies and pretty soon will be launching our own Internet access offering.

Are new Internet Service Providers competing for desktop space? What are the terms of those deals?

It's not been as competitive as it has been in the U.S. in the past few months, but I think it will get there very soon. We are working several deals with them. We'll also be looking at Internet partnerships. The deal with [Latin American Internet stockbroker] Patagon.com is a clear example of that.

What other ways do you plan to boost your sales via the Internet?

We foresee our major account relationships will be channeled through the Internet. We will be able to have extranets with them and receive orders and provide service through the Internet.

What's the future of the PC in Latin America?

We still have a lot of problems to overcome. When you need almost 10 days of transit time to get a product from Houston to Mexico, that's a lot in the modern world. But we are going in the right direction, and as we get rid of these obstacles, we will see a very strong increase in demand.