Gathered from Print4Pay Hotel Members from around the world and a few moles in very good places!- Hewlett Packard reported info on its fourth quarter financials:
- Revenue down 8%
- Revenue estimate for fiscal year of $119 billion
- MFP/printer division revenue dropped 20% to $5.7 billion
- Printer shipments dropped 23%
- Hewlett Packard has agreed to reduce its claim against bankrupt Circuit City to only $70.5 million.
- Hewlett Packard announced it will spend $2.7 billion to acquire 3Com Corp. Details:
- will now compete head to head with Cisco for network switching and routing equipment
- 3Com was founded in 1979 by Bob Metcalfe, and retired in 1990
- Bob Metcalfe invented Ethernet, while working for Xerox
- ship the first Ethernet adaptor in 1981
- 3Com sold its first PC Ethernet in 1982
- becomes world’s largest manufacturer of network interface cards (NICs)
- Hewlett Packard announced it won a managed print services contract from Leighton Contractors of Australia. Leighton employs 9,000 people in Australia and New Zealand. HP will reduce the fleet from a seven-to-one user to printer ratio to 10-to-one.
- Kyocera apparently has chosen to use PrintFleet software for its KYOfleetmanager managed print services program.
- Intel agreed to pay AMD a whopping $1.25 billion to settle an anti-trust lawsuit filed against the company by AMD.
- Kodak announced it is reducing its staff in British Columbia and shifting work to Israel. This will reduce the Canadian staff from 1265 to 500. The Canadian office was part of the $980 million acquisition of Creo in 2005. Also, Kodak sold some of its office space in the area for $43 million.
- Ricoh announced that it has sold an Aficio C900 production color system to GAM Printers, a print shop in Sterling, Virginia.
- Ricoh announced it is forming a Business Process Automation Group, as part of its Document Solutions & Services Division. “BPA is a true value-add for Ricoh customers because we’re able to offer a suite of services from consultation to sales to implementation under one roof” said Mark Miller, Senior VP & Deputy General Manager at Ricoh. Ricoh’s BPA consultants will “assist customers in turning their current processes into turnkey solutions to fit their workflow requirements”
- X-Rite, maker of color measuring devices, and Pantone color systems, announced its last quarter’s financials:
- net loss of $9 million
- net sales down 25.6% to $45.6 million
- operating income of $1.6 million
- X-Rite, which recently launched Pantone color software for the Apple iPhone, called “myPANTONE”, had the software tested by the Flemish Center for Graphic Communication. The research firm found that when it viewed certain Pantone colors on several iPhones, that each one had a different shade of color. (there is currently no way to calibrate the screen of an iPhone)
- After being acquired by Nuance Corp. last week, eCopy has laid off a portion of its staff.
Details:
- Richard Mack, VP of Corp. Communications, stated that less then one-third of staff was affected.
- Any layoff larger than that would have triggered the federal Worker Adjustment and Retraining Notification Act, which requires companies to provide advance notice of a mass layoff.
- Before layoffs, eCopy had 220 employees
- some of jobs will be transferred to Budapest, Hungary, where Nuance has office
- Nuance has 6,000 employees worldwide in 30 offices
- eCopy was started by a handful of people working out of Edward Schmid’s condominium in 1990, and was originally called Simplify Development Corp.
- Nuance, through its OmniPage division, provides OCR software to OmTool
- Tech Data Corp., a leading IT products distributor, announced a new Healthcare Specialized Business Unit to assist its computer resellers (VARs) meet growing demand in this vertical market:
- healthcare industry will spend $81 billion on IT in 2010, according to Gartner
- $22.8 billion will be spent on healthcare IT over next 6 years according to INPUT Research using federal funds from American Recovery & Reinvestment Act (ARRA)
- Department of Veterans Affairs has 2010 budget of $3.3 billion in IT spending
- American TonerServ, provider of generic laser print cartridges in Santa Rosa, CA, reported a 192% increase in last quarter’s revenue.
- Dell launched three new printers, with the following features:
- All are made by Fuji of Japan (which makes most Xerox copiers and printers)
- Dell 5130cdn is 47ppm A4 top speed full color laser printer for $1549 base MSRP
- 4 tandem OPC drum design
- polymerized toner
- optional paper drawers can make unit floor standing
- optional hanging stapler finisher
- unit’s exterior is dark grey plastic
- 8.5 second first print out time
- 1200x1200dpi
- 800MHz processor
- PCL and PostScript print drivers
- supports up to 216gsm paper weight
- auto duplex up to 163gsm
- Dell 7130cdn is A3 speed LED color printer for $2700 base MSRP (Xerox sells an MFP version)
- Dell 3330dn is 40ppm A4 b/w laser printer for $599 base MSRP
- In an effort to reduce costs, Colorado State University in Boulder, CO, announced it is closing its central reproduction department or campus printshop.
- Adobe Systems announced that it will layoff 9% of its workforce to cut costs. This will amount roughly 600 of its current 7,000 workers.
- Sun Microsystems announced it will layoff 128 workers at its Broomfield, Colorado campus. Oracle Corp. is attempting to buy Sun, but acquisition is being held up by European Union over antitrust concerns.
- Samsung of Korea lost a lawsuit to Sharp. Sharp’s lawsuit claimed that Samsung violated 4 of Sharp’s color LCD manufacturing patents.
- A report released by Samsung reveals that 83% of companies surveyed are not implementing basic technologies to reduce the volume of printed materials. Other findings:
- only 11% use a solution to track amount of pages printed
- over half of all document output costs are associated with purchasing paper and toner
- 69% of workers still prefer paper printouts
- A consortium of inkjet manufacturers have donated money to Cambridge University of London, England, to pursue development of a robust single pass production color printing system.
- Duplo, maker of duplicators, and finishing systems, announced it will create a sub brand, called Duplo Digital, to emphasize its finishing systems that are fully digital. (the company also sells relabeled Sharp digital b/w copiers)
- Two men were arrested in Eugene, Oregon for making counterfeit money with a color copier. Nicholas Pisciotta and Joseph Ulchinsky are facing forgery charges after police found a stash of fake $20 bills.
- According to survey, the average selling price of a b/w copy in a printshop is now 4.5 cents.
- EFI lost a lawsuit it filed against Leggett & Platt over supposed patent infringement regarding wide format color inkjet printers. EFI claimed that the company’s patent on UV ink curing was invalid.
- Canon announced it has hired John Hamm, former owner of Balmar Printing of Washington, to develop content for Canon’s imagePRESS Essential Business Builder Program. This is Canon’s option that can be sold to customers of Canon production color system to assist them in marketing and selling the output.
No comments:
Post a Comment