Does Brother Corporation Have it's Sights Set for Another Acquisition?

I was stunned when I read the report that Brother Corporation has signed an agreement to purchase certain assets of their document imaging division. The purchase agreement is to include document scanners. image capture software and technical services.  The price, mere 210 million US dollars. I wasn't stunned by the sale because I had heard and read that Kodak was shopping the document imaging business for quite sometime. The stunned part was that Brother Corporation was the buyer.

What were Ricoh, Kyocera, Xerox, Canon, Toshiba and KonicaMinolta thinking? Recently I had an opportunity to provide 20-30 production scanners to a large firm with over 3,000 employees. I was in with Fujitsu and had Kodak as the competition. I knew that Kodak was shopping the business and made sure I the prospect knew.

When you think about what types of companies need high production scanners you can only think that they would be some of the largest

MFP Wars & The Plain Paper Copier Industry

Most evenings I'll do a little bit of cruising around the web searching for copier information.  I ran across a white paper written by William R. Bolton in 1995 titled "The Plain Paper Copier Industry". 

Basically the paper was an outline of the plain paper copier industry up until 1994 or 95.  I used this paper to research a blog "Top 19 Old Copier Manufacturers That Faded Away".

Just the other day  I had an Anon (Anonymous) response to the blog I wrote for the "final five", it seems I ticked someone off because I projected that Sharp would not be one of the final five left in the industry.  ANON pointed out that although the blog was a nice read, they thought that my projection of Sharp was not correct because Sharp had just started operations of a 2nd manufacturing plant in China that was capable of producing 250,000 MFP's per year.  I responded with the fact that I saw the press release that Sharp is gearing up for the anticipated of more demand, but I think it's more for the Chinese Market Place. Here's the press release.  I'm also taking a guess that since the Great Flood in Thailand and the fact that one of Sharps copier manufacturing plants is located in the area of the Great Flood.  The Sharp factory was not damaged however Sharp had problems with securing parts from other suppliers that were affected.
Which brings me to back to a certain paragraph in the white paper.  History repeats its self right.  The white paper predicted that only 7 to 8 copier manufacturers would be left in the global market place by 1997.  Let's see if we can get this right: 
Xerox, Ricoh, Sharp, Canon, Toshiba, Oce, Mita, Konica, Panasonic and Minolta.  This would be 11 copier manufacturers that were players in 1994.  I did not include Kodak due to the fact that their plain paper copier line was OEM'd by Canon.  I can't remember when but Konica & Minolta merged thus leaving 8 manufacturers somewhere in 2002. 

Weekend Copier & MFP Industry Threads

Thought I'd just take the time to share some of the interesting threads that have been posted on the Print4Pay Hotel forums in the recent week. If you're not familiar with the site, the Print4Pay Hotel forums designed for the Imaging (copiers, mfp, printers, mps) Professionals to seek information, gather knowledge and collaborate with Industry Peers in a secure setting.  To date we have over 2,300 registered members from all almost every country in the world.  Visit the Print4Pay Hotel and then click on the link for forum access (it's FREE).

Most Viewed Threads
Monocomponent vs. Dual Component
Comments on the Canon 1730/1740/1750 Models
Sharp MX-2310U/MX4111N
Western Digital Factory Under Water
Question for everyone..... with leasing are any of
Kodak & Possible Buyers?
Rumor has it.....
New Rep needs encouragement

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Ricoh SP5200 Brochure
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Check this ^%$^ out!
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Request for Proposals

Purchase of one (1) unit Taskalfa Kyocera-Mita
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STATEWIDE IT PROCUREMENT OFFICE (NC)

Daily Copier & MFP Industry Notes from around the World

The world’s struggling economy made events worldwide in 2009 a damp squib. It had little effect on India’s print industry and on Pamex 2010. And this year’s event is set to be no different. If you have still not thought what to do after the Diwali festivities are over, listen up, because between 1-4 November something important is happening in New Delhi...read more here

CEO Lawrence Gamblin indicated in court papers filed Monday that his company intends to stick to its intention to withdraw a longstanding contract with Eastman Kodak Co. and directly supply ink to most Kodak's Versamark printer customers. ...read more here

At PAMEX 2011, Kodak will showcase its wide portfolio of innovative products and services for printers, publishers, and packaging professionals. Visitors to the Kodak booth, Hall 4, will learn about a variety of KODAK Products ranging from thermal CTP devices to digital printing presses, as well as workflow and packaging solutions. "Visitors come to PAMEX....read more here

Alleroed, Denmark -- November 1, 2011 -- Contex, the world's leading developer of wide format scanning and imaging solutions, today announces the all-new HD Ultra wide format scanner. The HD Ultra is the market's most advanced wide format scanner, featuring unmatched productivity and versatility. Built with Contex's next generation xDTR2, its exclusive extended data transfer rate with...read more here

LAKE SUCCESS, N.Y., Nov 01, 2011  -- Canon U.S.A., Inc., a leader in digital imaging solutions, today announced the availability of the EFI(TM) PrintMe(R) mobile print solution for Canon imageRUNNER ADVANCE multifunction office products (MFPs). Developed by EFI utilizing Canon's MEAP platform, EFI PrintMe provides an intuitive method for mobile device users to send documents through EFI's PrintMe Service for output on Canon imageRUNNER ADVANCE MFPs. Offering significant...read more here

-=Good Selling=-

Daily Copier & MFP Industry Notes from around the World

Konica Minolta to Highlight Corporate Initiatives at Graph Expo 2011 ...Read 'Konica Minolta to Highlight Corporate Initiatives at Graph Expo 2011' on Yahoo! News. Provides Production Print Customers with Valuable Resources ...read more

Konica Minolta Donates Award-Winning bizhub Press C8000 to ...Read 'Konica Minolta Donates Award-Winning bizhub Press C8000 to Printing Industries of America' on Yahoo! News. Next Generation Color Digital Press ...read more

Xerox, Customers Receive Industry Accolades at Graph Expo 2011Digital printing systems and software from Xerox and XMPie were awarded eight honors in the annual "Must See 'ems" award program, and 12 Gold Ink Awards recognizing exceptional digital printing technology in commercial print and graphic arts industries ...read more

New Fiery XF proServer Maximizes Throughput of EFI VUTEk Superwide Inkjet Printers CHICAGO, Sept. 12, 2011 GRAPH EXPO -- EFI, a world leader in customer-focused digital printing innovation, today launched Fiery® XF proServer...read more

ROCHESTER, N.Y., – At Graph Expo 2011, KODAK Technology is featured in more than a dozen booths throughout the show. These offerings, from workflow automation to print finishing solutions, are used to create a range of innovative applications and...read more

CHICAGO—Sept. 12, 2011—Océ, a Canon Group company and an international leader in digital document management, today announced that GRAPH EXPO 2011 marks the public debut of the Océ ColorStream® 3500 system in North America. Unveiled at Canon Expo in...read more

ROCKVILLE, MD--(Sep 12, 2011) - MarketResearch.com has announced the addition of the new report "U.S. Peripherals 2011-2015 Forecast and Analysis" to their collection of Computer Equipment market reports. For more information,...read more

-=Good Selling=-

Daily Copier & MFP Industry Notes from around the World

Valhalla, NY, September 7, 2011 – FUJIFILM North America Corporation, Graphic Systems Division will present an outstanding array of innovative solutions at GRAPH EXPO 2011, September 11 – 14, 2011, at McCormick Place South in Chicago, Illinois at booth # 627. Exhibiting under the banner “expect INNOVATION™” Fujifilm will demonstrate the products and technology that printers are looking for to strengthen their businesses and expand their operating capabilities...read more

TOKYO, Sep 07, 2011 - Delivering his keynote speech at the India-Japan Global Partnership Summit 2011 which was held from September 5-7 in Tokyo, Kazuo Inamori, founder and chairman emeritus of Kyocera Corporation, emphasized the importance of adopting an altruistic approach so that the two nations can develop a true partnership based on mutually beneficial relations...read more

HARWOOD HEIGHTS, Ill., Sept. 7, 2011 -- FCL Graphics Incorporated, a leading North American printer of marketing and direct mail materials, today announced major investments to enhance and expand services to marketers and producers of communication materials...read more

ROCKVILLE, MD, Sep 07, 2011  -- Notable Solutions, Inc. (NSi), a leading developer of distributed content capture and workflow solutions, today announced that it has achieved record revenue for its fiscal year ending June 30, 2011, reporting year over year growth of 35 percent. The company's...read more

Costa Mesa, CA – September 7, 2011 – Paradigm Imaging Group, a leading distributor of large-format scanning and printing solutions, tradeshow displays and graphics, releases the Graphtec CSX530-09 Large Format Scanner.
The CSX530-09 features Graphtec's new Luxios™ scanning...read more

Kodak has introduced a new range of all-in-one printers which are Google Cloud PrintReady, allowing users to print documents and photos from anywhere in the world using any internet connected device. Users can also use Kodak Email PrintReady to send printing jobs, which the ...read more

-=Good Selling=-

MFP Weekend Industry Notes 3/13/2011

Everyone this will be my last blog until 3/24/2011, off to Aruba with the wife for President's Club!!! Yippe!

- Hewlett Packard officials are refuting a story being published in Asian newspapers that claims that the company is going to sell its hardware business to Samsung or Lenovo. HP executive, Bill Wohl said; “irresponsible reporting and should be dismissed as market rumor and speculation”

- A California judge ruled that HP may keep shielded from the public documents related to its summary judgement motion in a long-running class action suit over an alleged display screen defect in its Pavillion notebook computers.

- IDC reports that the worldwide printer and copier market grew by 7% in last quarter of 2010.

- ProSource, a Konica Minolta dealer in Cincinnati, Ohio, announced it acquired docuVision, a local document management systems dealer.

- ECi, which makes software used by copier dealers to run their business (OMD, LaCrosse, NexGen, etc.) announced it has acquired FM Audit, which makes managed print services software. Purchase price not announced.

- Thomas Reprographics, NRI and CallPrint have formed LINK Document Services Group, which will be a joint venture to provide managed print services to customers in the U.S. LINK’s first action was to acquire Sepialine, Inc. and its Argos software platform.

- Toshiba announced it will invest to expand its plant in Houston, Texas which makes electric motors for hybrid automobiles.

- Lexmark is preparing itself to be sold, according to Frank Voisin, of iStockAnalysis. The company has taken following recent actions that are common when a company wants to sell:

o amended its employment agreements

o ensuring continued employment and benefits for senior executives in case of change in control

o providing bonus if terminated without good cause following change in control

- Police in Gainesville, FL arrested Douglas Brian Osborne after he attempted to use fake $20 bills at a local Stubby’s restaurant that he made using a color copier.

- Police in Texas are searching the Alamo area for people who are using fake $20 bills made on a color copier to buy products from local Kmart, Walgreens and Lowes stores.

- Nuance announced the availability of a Macintosh version of its PDF Converter software.
- Kodak announced it has borrowed $250 million via a private placement of senior secured notes due in 2019. $50 million of these funds will be used to refinance a previous loan that was due in 2013.

-=Good Selling=-

MFP Weekend Industry Notes from 3/6/2011

Special thanx to Print4Pay Hotel members and our moles from across the globe for posting these updates on the P4P Hotel forums!



- Hewlett Packard announced that over 2,000 printshop personnel attended the Dscoop Annual Conference in Orlando, FL, which is a gathering of HP Indigo production color users.
- Hewlett Packard gave out details of its Imaging & Printing Group’s (IPG) last quarter’s financials:

o revenue up 7%

o 17% operating margin

o 33% increase in commercial printer hardware units placed

- Hewlett Packard announced it sold an HP T350 production color inkjet system to Griffin Press of Australia.

- Lexmark announced a new option for some of its desktop color printers and MFPs called SmartSolution Weather App, which lets users check weather forecasts directly on the color LCD panels of the devices, and print out weather reports for selected zip codes.

- Oce’, a division of Canon, announced it won a world-wide managed print services contract from GDF SUEZ:

o 9,000 devices

o Offices in more than 20 countries

o Contract worth 55 million euros

- UDOCX, a company in the Netherlands, announced that its new product will extend any browser-embedded MFP with mail, print, store and fax features without need to install any additional software or hardware:

o Cloud-based document processing service

o Direct access to MS Outlook Contacts stored in MS Exchange

o Documents stored in predefined places

o No unauthorized access

o Printing of stored document initiated from MFP

o Fax with fax board

o No software maintenance

o Administrative control from web interface

o Pay as you go subscription fee

- After a year of speculation, Heidelberg finally announced which company it decided to partner with to sell digital production color systems.

o The company chosen was Ricoh

o Will develop a connector to the Ricoh Aficio Pro C901 production color system for its digital offset press Prinect workflow

o Will resell the Ricoh Pro C901 Graphic Arts Edition

 90ppm unit with PxP polymerized toner and 2 bits per pixel output

 Ricoh will provide service via IKON or dealers

- Ricoh announced that its planned launch of a new 47ppm and 52ppm b/w A4 MFPs has been delayed until 7/1/2011.

- Cornell University’s Hoe Lipson and colleagues are working on “bio-printing” technology, using a converted inkjet printer to grow human tissue, such as skin, bone and cartilage.

- Intel announced it is pushing to sell its Atom processor to printer and MFP makers for their print controllers, as it is now available with a built-in high speed PCI Express Interface, meaning devices can connect directly to the chip without a separate I/O controller.

- The Canadian federal government awarded its printer contract to:

o Hewlett Packard

o Okidata

o Kyocera

o Xerox

o Dell

o Vendors on contract last year that did make cut were Lexmark, Samsung, Sharp and Ricoh

- A report issued by Morgan Stanley predicts:

o sales of tablet computers will cause 1-2% decline in spending on toner and ink due to less printing in 2011

o will decline 2.4% in 2012

o tablet users print 20-35% less inkjet pages and 8-15% less laser pages

- A report by GAP Intelligence states:

o In last 2 years, the average color click charge for office-class color A3 MFPs has dropped by over 10% to $0.0658 in government contracts

- Toshiba announced it will provide turbines for a geothermal plant in New Zealand.

- Toshiba announced that it is now selling used/refurbished HP LaserJet printers that it sources from Global Printer Services of Wisconsin.

- In a study conducted by the Columbia Journalism Review gives more proof of value of printed page:

o Reader of printed version of the New York Times newspaper spend on average 30 minutes per day reading newspaper

o Reader of on-line version spend only average of 14 minutes and 29 seconds reading

- Sharp launched the PN-L601B-PKG, which includes:

o 60” color LED backlit touch panel display

o Compact PN-TPC1W whiteboard PC

o SR-560M rolling cart floor stand

o “a well designed, comprehensive and highly performing interactive whiteboard solution” said Steve Brauner, Senior Product Planning Manager

- Sharp gave out details on 4 future b/w A3 laser MFPs, called the MX-M282N, 362N, 452N and 502N featuring:

o Top speeds of 28, 36, 45 & 50ppm respectively

o All made by Sharp

o Based on “Jupiter III” platform

o 7” color touchscreen LCD display

 Do not have retractable keyboard

o Optional document feeder holds up to 100 originals, but does NOT scan both sides of original at same time

o Comes standard with two 500 sheet paper drawers and 100 sheet bypass

o 500 sheet internal exit tray with offset stacking

o Optional internal stapling finisher

 Optional external stapling finisher or bookletmaking finisher

• Requires bridge unit

• Optional hole punching

o Built-in print controller

 Actual maker unknown (most likely Zoran)

 576MB RAM for copier memory and 1GB RAM for printer memory

 Optional data security kit (but it is not Common Criteria certified)

 800MHz processor

 80GB hard drive

 10/100/1000BaseT & USB ports

 PCL print driver standard

- Kodak announced that its NexPress production color system won 8 awards for Superb Printing from the International Association of Printing House Craftsmen (IAPHC)

- President Obama announced the appointment of Kodak CEO, Antonio Perez, to the President’s Council of Jobs and Competitiveness, along with Xerox CEO, Ursula Burns, and GE CEO, Jeffrey Inmelt.

- Secret Service agents arrested Paul Rickett of Mountain View, California for filling a minivan with $30,000 worth of fake cash, made with a color copier.
- Okidata announced it will use environmentally-friendly bioplastics for some of the parts in its LED color printers and MFPs. The bioplastics will contain 25% plant material.
- Zoran, maker of print controllers, announced it is being acquired by CSR, maker of wireless chips, for $679 million

- Conexant Sytems, maker of print controllers, announced it is being acquired by SMSC (Standard Microsystems Corporation) of Long Island, NY for $284 million. (this company has technology from former companies; Rockwell Semiconductor, Oasis Semiconductor & SigmaTel)

-=Good Selling=-

MFP Weekend Industry Notes for 2/27/2011

Special thanx to Print4Pay Hotel members and moles from across the globe  for posting these updates on the P4P Hotel forums!

- Canon announced that it has finalized sale of its interest in a semiconductor plant in Singapore to Micron Technology of Boise, Idaho.
- Canon, Samsung and Hewlett Packard were all sued by Lodsys LLC in regards to alleged patent infringement over technology that exchanges info with customers via printers.

- Canon announced it will donate “one million dollars of in-kind printing services” from its LA branch to Operation HOPE. Curriculum will be printed by Canon and distributed by HOPE Corps to educate youth at no cost in area school districts, according to Canon’s VP of Zone Operations Eddie Saji.

- Marvell Technology (which makes print controller technology for companies like Xerox, etc.) was sued by Link A Media Devices Corp. over alleged patent infringement regarding hard drive technology.

- Zoran of California, which makes controllers for MFPs (i.e. Xerox, Canon, Ricoh, Sharp, etc.) as well as DVD players, Blu-Ray players, cable TV boxes and video games, announced it will be launching a product called “DirectOffice Mobile Print”.

o This new option for its print controllers will allow end users to print to their MFPs from smartphones and tablets via WiFi wireless technologies.

o Made in partnership with another print controller technology company, Software Imaging Inc. of England.

- Okidata is launching the pro905DP, which is a color desktop LED-based toner printer that is specially made for envelope printing. MSRP of $18,995 and includes an EFI Fiery.

- Hewlett Packard announced it has acquired Vertica Systems Inc. of Billerica, Massachusetts, which makes software that “helps business spot trends hidden in large amounts of data”. Purchase price not announced.

- Hewlett Packard announced that LG Electronics will relabel some of its printers in Asia. LG already relabels product from Lexmark.

- HP’s new CEO, Leo Apotheker, purchased a 6 bedroom home in Atherton, CA for $7 million.

- HP announced it won a 7 year, $281 million managed IT services contract from Oklahoma Healthcare Authority.

- Hewlett Packard announced HP Digital Health Solutions:

o Portfolio of products, solutions and partnerships

o holistically addresses the technology needs of care delivery

o expanded solution framework and formal reference architectures

o real-time information environment

o enable healthcare organizations to link to monitor health and deliver care to patients

o On display in the HP Health Solutions Center showroom in Plano, TX

- IKON, a division of Ricoh, announced it has filed suit against two former FM employees for supposedly violating a non-compete clause. The suit was filed against John Kolacinski and Robert Hornbeck, who now work for Myriad Litigation Solutions of California.

- Electronics For Imaging, maker of the Fiery print server, announced:

o It will buy back $30 million of its stock shares

o Has acquired Streamline Development, maker of PrintStream management information systems (MIS) software for printshop owners

- Kodak announced it sold a Prosper 5000XL production color inkjet system to Servinform, a printshop in Spain.

- Survey on proposed new leasing rules, by Deloitte:

o Only 7% of companies polled are ready for new rules, which would force companies to put leases on their books

o 80% say it will add burden to their financial reporting

o 40% said it will make it more difficult to obtain financing

o 40% believe it will force them into shorter term leases

o 35% don’t believe that their company’s lease data is accurate

o 25% believe it will require them to upgrade their existing IT systems

- Sharp announced it filed a lawsuit against a former Sharp branch copier sales rep in Phoenix, AZ. The lawsuit is aimed at Brenda Luettenegger, for allegedly violating a non-compete clause.

- According to one industry publication, the new Sharp copiers with the “Apple iPhone-like” touchscreen color LCDs, have been locking up in product demonstrations.

- The largest Sharp dealer in Canada, is Pitney Bowes, with a number of locations in the country. (while Pitney Bowes spun off it copier business in the U.S. as Imagistics, which is now part of Canon, it did not do so in Canada)

- Square 9 Softworks of New Haven, CT, maker of the SmartSearch document management software (DMS), announced that it now has panel integration option for both Xerox copiers (with EIP) and Sharp copiers (with OSA). It is also working on integration with Kodak desktop scanners

- OpenText of Waterloo, Ontario, Canada, (maker of RightFax, FaxPress, and document management software) announced it has completed its acquisition of Metastorm of Baltimore, Maryland, which makes business process management software, for $182 million.

- DocuLex, maker of document management software, announced that it has new feature allowing end users to pull email out of Microsoft Exchange 2010.

-=Good Selling=-

MFP Weekend Industry Notes from 1/04/2010

- Microsoft co-founder, Paul Allen, announced he is renewing his effort to sue Apple, Google, Facebook, eBay, AOL and other companies for patent infringement. The patents at issue are owned by Interval Research, which was founded by Allen and Xerox’s David Liddle in 1992.


- Pitney Bowes announced that Patrick Keddy, Executive VP and President, will retire at end of year.

- Hewlett Packard announced it sold an Indigo W7200 production color system to Schmidt Printing of Byron, Minnesota.

- Adobe Corp. reported it first billion dollar quarter. In the fourth quarter of fiscal 2010, Adobe achieved record revenue of $1.008 billion.

- Brother announced a new promotion where customers who buy replacement ink cartridges get a free music download from EMI.

- Fuji, maker of most Xerox copiers, announced that future models will have “Smart Power Saving Technology”, where power will provided on an as needed basis. For example, if end user is scanning, then power is not supplied to print engine to save electricity.

- Impact of proposed new leasing rules studied. PricewaterhouseCoopers stated that it conducted a survey of the impact of proposed new rules that would do away with off-balance-sheet accounting for equipment leases. The study revealed that 24% of companies surveyed would experience an increase in debt of over 25%.

- Kyocera (aka Kyoto Ceramic Company) announced the following awards won:

o BLI stated that test of FS-1320D and FS-1370DN b/w laser printers delivered “flawless” reliability

o Industry Analysts Inc. gave “most reliable” rating to TASKalfa 250ci and TASKalfa 300ci color laser MFPs

o BERTL gave “Outstanding” ratings to FS-C2125MFP and FS-3140MFP

- Kyocera announced it now offers an embedded/panel integration HyPAS connector for docSTAR Eclipse document management system.

- Office Products Analyst Inc. stated that in a recent survey of 232 printshop owners:

o Kodak NexPress production color systems were rated the most reliable

o Sharp b/w MFPs (not production units) were rated most reliable

o Canon products were least reliable.

- Canon apparently is planning on selling a LCD manufacturing division to Hon Hai Precision Industry Co. of Taiwan (aka Foxconn) for $1.2 billion.

- Canon announced it plans on buying controlling interest in Altair Nanotechnologies Inc. of Reno, NV, which makes lithium ion electrical energy storage systems.

- A new survey conducted by Lexmark finds that 7 out of 10 offices workers that have access to wireless connection to their printers do not use it, due to connectivity and security issues.
- According to Contextworld, the best selling desktop color laser printer in the world is the Samsung CLP-315, beating out the HP Color LaserJet CP2025n by twice as many sales.

-=Good Selling=-

Last Week in Copier "Industry Notes" 11/7/10

Special thanx to Print4Pay Hotel Members from around the world and a few moles in very good places for posting these great threads!

Take a moment and join the largest group of copier professionals in the world. Here's the link for the P4P Hotel forums!

-The Secret Service claims that it has pulled $182 million in fake bills from circulation in 2009, more than double the $79 million it pulled in 2008. Almost 62% of this counterfeit U.S. currency was made using color MFPs

- Okidata now shipping new desktop A4 b/w MFPs that it is sourcing from Lexmark. The new B700 series are actually based on the Lexmark X650 series, which offer a large 9” touch screen color LCD control panel.
o Speeds range from 42ppm to 52ppm
o Base MSRPs range form $625 to $1249
o (so while Okidata touts its own LED technology in its color engines as superior to laser, it uses Lexmark laser engines for its b/w products)

- The Flagstaff, AZ fire department reported that a fire in the University of Northern Arizona Student Union was caused by an overheating copier.
- Fuji announced it has opened a new research and development lab for printing technology, called the R&D Square in Yokohama, Japan. Other details mentioned:
o In 1985 is made its first laser printer for relabeling by other vendors
o In 1986, launched first printer that it marketed on its own, called the Fuji Xerox 4105
o In 2001, purchased laser printer business from NEC Corp.
o Its other R&D lab for printers is the Ebina Center in Kanagawa, Japan
o Tadahito Yamamoto is President and Representative Director
o Has developed new technology called “SLED”
o SLED is “Self-scanning Light Emitting Device”
 features an electronic pulse each time the opening is only one point of light-emitting LED light, LED light points, one by one, move to the front.
 A line of LED light-emitting operations signal to control an input.
 Each SLED chip has a total of 57 LEDs
 In conventional LED printer, to offer up to 1200dpi, it needs to double the drive chip and twice the signal line, but the multi-chip Fuji ASIC drive can operate 14, 592 light points
 Traditional LED technology print images with color transitions that are not natural

- FMAudit of Jefferson City, Missouri, announced version 3.2 of its managed print services software, that it claims has 180 new features.

- Sharp announced it paid $305 million to complete acquisition of Recurrent Energy of San Francisco, which develops solar projects. (however, the company apparently still has not yet spend any R&D for production print products for its copier dealers and branches to sell)

- Sharp’s VP of Marketing, Mike Marusic, gave out more details on the design of the document feeders on its new Frontier “Scan-Centric” series of color and b/w A4 MFPs:
o Color version has base MSRP of $8945
o b/w version has base MSRP of $5695
o Top print speed of 40ppm
o Ruggedized rubber feed tires that can handle thicker card stock
o Rollers can also handle the raised letter of plastic credit cards or ID cards
o Cards pass straight through to the other side of the document feeder (unlike when feeding normal paper originals) so the cards are not bent or damaged
o Viable alternative to production scanners

- Sharp gave out details of its last quarter’s financials:
o Company slashed its full year profit projection by 20%
o Warned of “increasingly severe business condition”
o Net profit of $175.2 million for last 6 months
o Revenue up 16.7% to 1.5 trillion yen
o For full fiscal year expects net profit of 30 billion yen
o Big decline in demand for large size color LCDs
o No mention made of its office equipment division

- Digitex Corp, a Canon/Ricoh dealer owned by Mark Kinley in Houston, has purchased Capco Systems, another Canon dealer in Houston. Capco was previously owned by Constantine Pontikes, and was originally named Houston Typewriter.

- According to some authors, Google Docs will soon have a new feature that will allow users to print documents to any Internet-connected printer, anywhere in the world. For it to work, users will have to install small piece of software on a computer that’s on the same network as the printer. The computer has to be turned on and connected to the Internet for the print service to work.

- Microsoft launched a beta version of Microsoft Office 365, which is a cloud based package that offers a complete set of business functions.

- Artifex Software Corp., maker of print drivers, announced version 9.0 of its Ghostscript drivers featuring:
o PostScript Level 3 compatibility
o PDF 1.7
o PCL 5e, 5c & XL
o Microsoft XPS
o PostScript to PDF conversion
o XPS to PDF conversion
o ICC based color rendering workflow
o Stores two separate color space settings
o Support for optional content to the PDF interpreter
o Claims to have 100 OEM customers

- Scan capture software maker, Kofax, reported that last quarter it had revenue of $216 million, which was up 27%. (Kofax is very popular in the healthcare market, and its leading reseller is IKON/Ricoh)

- Kodak was ordered by government in England to pull its TV ads claiming that its color inkjet printers would save end users money as compared with using other brands. The agency claims that the Kodak ads were misleading.

- eCareme Technologies Inc. announced it will launch a cloud printing service that will allow end users to send their print jobs to any 7-ELEVEN store in Taiwan that has a connected MFP. Pricing not announced.

- Ricoh announced it will provide 32 MFPs and printers for the upcoming Asia Pacific Economic Cooperation Summit in Yokohama, Japan.

- Ricoh announced the launch of “Ricoh intelligent invoicing” or i-invoicing, which allows customers to outsource the receipt and production of all invoices to Ricoh. Ricoh claims that this will save customers 70-90% using the system. The initial launch will only be in Europe.

- Ricoh announced it is the “Official Document Solutions Partner” for the Philadelphia Eagles football team.

- Lexmark, whose CEO last week announced his is departing, now announced that it is combining its laser and inkjet divisions into one, called Imaging Solutions and Services or ISS, led by Executive VP, Marty Canning, reporting to new CEO, Paul Rooke.

- Business Research & Testing Laboratories (BERTL) gave out Fall 2010 Best Awards to:
o HP LaserJet PRO P1606dn b/w laser printer
o Ricoh InfoPrint 1357EX b/w production print system
o Sharp MX-M753N b/w laser MFP
o Kyocera Copystar FS2026/C2126/FS3040/3140 MFPs
o Konica Minolta bizhub C35 A4 color MFP
o Ricoh Aficio MP 4001/5001 b/w MFPs
o Xerox 7755/7775 MFPs

- Former IKON executive, Jim Gallagher, was hired as VP of Sales for McGrath Systems, a human capital management firm.

- Hewlett Packard sold an Indigo 7500 production color system to Group Momentum, a printshop in Sydney, Australia. It also sold an Indigo 5500 to ASAP Digital of Sheffield, England.

- Apple sued Motorola, alleging that the company’s smartphone lineup and operating system it sues infringe on iPhone patents.

- Kyocera (aka Kyoto Ceramic Company) announced it will buy the Software Engineering division of Epson in the Philippines. This office employs 70, and currently writes software for Epson printers and MFPs.

- Hitachi announced it has developed a new continuous inkjet print head technology, called “RX”

-=Good Selling=-

MFP Industry Notes from Around the World!

Special thanx to Print4Pay Hotel Members from around the world and a few moles in very good places!Take a moment and join the largest group of copier professionals in the world. Here's the link for the P4P Hotel forums

- Intel announced it is spending $1.4 billion to buy Infineon, maker of wireless network technology, which is found in Apple products.

- Adobe announced it will partner with Monotype Imaging to provide print drivers to MFP and printer makers. The two companies will offer a package that includes PCL, PostScript and XPS drivers, to compete against other makers like Global Graphics & Zoran.

- Hewlett Packard announced it won a managed print services contract from AIB in Ireland.

o 5 year contract

o Reduced fleet from one device for every 4 employees to one for every 12

o Included MFPs and LaserJet 4250dtn and Color LaserJet 4700dtn laser printers

o Included SafeCom solution to allow ID card readers on devices for authentication

o Claims to have reduced operating costs from 20-30%

- Hewlett Packard is sued. About 1 year ago, HP announced a partnership with large commercial printer, R.R. Donnelley, to develop variable data technologies. Now R.R. Donnelley has filed a lawsuit against HP over alleged patent violations, claiming that the violations are “willful and deliberate.”

- Hewlett Packard is fighting a claim by security firm, Zscaler Labs, that hackers can use the Webscan feature to capture images from documents that are left in Hewlett Packard scanners and MFPs that have an embedded Web server. Michael Sutton of Zscaler Labs claims that he was able to find many HP scanners on the Internet.

- Hewlett Packard announced it sold an Indigo 7000 production color system to Color By, a printshop in Italy.

- Hewlett Packard agreed to pay $55 million to settle claims it paid kickbacks so companies would recommend its products to U.S. government agencies.

- Hewlett Packard announced it won an $800 million bid to provide laptops and desktop PCs to U.S. Air Force.

- Hewlett Packard won a bidding war against Dell over both companies’ attempt to buy 3PAR Corp., which make data storage technology for cloud computing. HP will pay $2.1 billion for the firm. Details on 3PAR:

o founded 11 years ago by former Sun Microsystems employees

o original stock price was $10 per share, but sold at $33 per share

o the letters “P”, “A” and “R” stand for names of three founders

o based in Fremont, CA

o 670 employees

- Hewlett Packard announced study by BLI that apparently shows end users will have less print quality and service issues if they use official HP ColorLok paper with their color laser devices. Using ColorLok paper supposedly will lead to 4 times fewer faults and more than 4 times fewer paper path obstructions.

- IBM Corp. has beat a breach of contract lawsuit that accused the company of shorting a current sales rep on a commission he claimed he was owed in connection with a $3.8 million in licensing feeds Motorola Corp. paid IBM for software patents.

- IBM claims it has developed the world’s fastest microprocessor chip, running at 5.2GHz.

- Epson is fighting to keep an internal report private in a lawsuit. Apparently it was released by a disgruntled former executive, and may detail a misrepresentation of the quality of Epson inkjet cartridges.

- International Data Corporation (IDC) gave out it findings of worldwide market sales of printers and MFPs in last quarter:

o Includes inkjet and laser devices, from desktop to printshop

o total market grew 20%

o 29 million units shipped

o Total value increased by 14% to $13.3 billion

o B/w laser MFPs grew 39.7% (the first time that b/w had more growth than color)

o Color laser MFPs grew 33%

o HP shipped 2.8 million laser units, and 11.9 units total including inkjet

o Samsung color laser MFPs grew 55% to 108,731 units

o Samsung b/w laser MFPs grew 54% to 500,777 units

o 9 million total laser based units shipped

o 66% of market belonged to inkjet technology (primarily home use devices)

o Inkjet grew 14% to 19 million units

o 78% of inkjet units were MFPs

o In U.S., total shipments grew 14.4%

- Ricoh announced it sold an Aficio PRO C720s production color system to Noel-Baker School and Language College in England.

- Kodak announced a new solution partnership for its high speed scanners. The Kodak scanners, with the optional Kodak Capture Pro Software, now integrates with CAPSYS CAPTURE to create workflows for document management systems.

- In a study of 410 small companies conducted by 1&1 Internet Ltd:

o 37% reported that money is lost from employees failing to share updated versions of documents

o 53% are held back by poor archiving of emails and documents

o 59% of business owners are unable to amend documents when they are off premises

o Over half of business owners believe that their staff is wasting money with excessive printing

- IT departments across the country are facing a looming Microsoft Windows 7 migration deadline, as support for Windows XP will end in 4 years. Gartner study shows:

o Many are starting their migrations at end of 2010

o IT budgets will need to increase between 20% to 60% to accommodate the updates

o Cost of IT labor will also increase

o Estimated migration cost per PC will be between $1205 and $1999

o Capital costs account for 60% of total replacement cost

o Average business will have to replace 25% of its PC early

- The Marin County Board of Supervisors of California voted to stop the implementation of an SAP project, and admitted to wasting over $30 million when it awarded the SAP project to Deloitte Consulting. Marin County has sued Deloitte to get its money back.

- Worldox, maker of document management systems (DMS) to the legal industry, announced it won a contract from Hoskin, Farina & Kampf, a law firm in Colorado. Total cost = $32,975.00

- Microsoft was forced to apologize to attendees of a tradeshow in Australia. The company had hired female models for its booth, but apparently was unaware that they would show up wearing bikinis.

- Microsoft cofounder, Paul Allen is suing Apple, Google and 9 other companies claiming they are violating patents he owns

- Apple has sued Kodak, claiming it violated some of its digital camera patents.

- NER Data Corp, which was a maker of compatible toner cartridges, announced it has sold that business, and now plans on becoming a national provider of managed print services, using genuine HP cartridges.

- Lexmark was ordered by a judge to pay $8.3 million to compensate its California employees for a flawed “use it or lose it” vacation pay policy. Judge Greg Alarcon ruled that 178 employees should be compensated for vacation time they did not use before they were terminated.

- Sharp announced it hired Eric Hafter, to run its new Solar Energy Solutions Group, reporting to CEO, Kozo Takahashi.


- Now that Peerless has sold its print controller business to Kyocera, it only has 4 employees in a 2,000 square foot office, and is part owner of Highbury Financial.


- Sharp announced a new A3 color laser MFP, called the MX-2310F featuring:

o 23ppm top speed

o 4 tandem OPC drum design

o New compact design, smaller than other Sharp A3 color MFPs

o Uses a polymer resin frame, to reduce weight of main unit by one third of other SharA3 color MFPs (is this first copier to have a frame that is not made of metal?)

o Uses 77% less power

o Uses LEDs in scanning section instead of fluorescent lamps

o Faster warm up time

o Standby mode uses only 1 watt of power

o Uses new Sharp Microtoner HG2 toner

o 7” touch screen LCD control panel

o Ship data and pricing not yet announced

- A 44 year old man is being pursued in United Arab Emirates after attempting to cash two fake $1 million dollar bills made on a color copier.

- Bret Rhind and Debra Roberson of Missouri were charged with making fake currency using a color copier after they attempted to spend it at Walmart, Target and Lowes. The phony cash was passed in 19 states, and included fake $50 and $100 bills.

- Pitney Bowes announced that it spent $210,000 in the second quarter of 2010 to lobby the federal government. The company’s FM division, called PMBS, is now run by Vicki O’Meara, who was hired after the division reported a 5% drop in revenue in early 2010

-=Good Selling=-

MFP Weekend Industry Notes 8/22/10

Special thanx to Print4Pay Hotel Members from around the world and a few moles in very good places!Take a moment and join the largest group of copier professionals in the world. Here's the link for the P4P Hotel forums.

- The U.S. Commerce Department stated that businesses have boosted their spending on equipment and software by 21.9% in the second quarter of 2010. Related:
o KPMG stated its survey showed that 35% of manufacturing executives expect to increase spending on equipment/software in 2010
o 27% of service company executives will increase spending

- According to InfoTrends, color printing will gain share of revenue (equipment, supplies and service) from 65% to 77% in 2014.

- Muratec launches the MFX-2590 featuring:
o A4 b/w laser desktop MFP
o Actually made by Muratec
o 8.5” color LCD control panel
o Base MSRP of $3995
o 25ppm top speed
o 600x600dpi
o Copy/scan/print/fax standard

- Oce’, a division of Canon, announced it would relabel a Brother A4 b/w laser MFP, and call it the Oce’ VarioLink 3200x with top speed of 32ppm.

- Oce’ announced that it won a facilities management contract from Rolls-Royce Aerospace. Oce’ claims it is saving the firm up to 735,000 euros, and reduced the fleet by 100 machines.

- Office Products Analyst announced the results of its annual Color MFP End User survey. Details:
o based on respondents from survey sent to businesses across the U.S.
o users were ask to rate the performance and effectiveness of their color laser MFP in the following categories:
 total cost of operation
 operability/functionality
 image quality
 workstation/network compatibility
o The manufacturer that received the greatest number of first place ratings was
= Konica Minolta
o The manufacturer that received the highest overall average rating was
= Konica Minolta

-Ricoh apparently will be relabeling a Brother made desktop unit, and call it the FAX1190L for $595 MSRP. (manufacturer’s suggested retail price)

-A scientist from Argonne National Laboratory, named Mr. Vilas G. Pol, claims that he has invented a way to make toner from discarded plastic grocery bags.

- Hewlett Packard announced it sold two Indigo 5500 digital color systems to L&L Printers of San Diego, CA. It also sold an Indigo 7500 system to ORWO Net of Germany.

- The Japanese government fined Hewlett Packard $270 million for underreporting its taxable income.

- A group of investors is suing former HP CEO, Mark Hurd, claiming his disclosures surrounding his resignation led to a drop in share value.

- Microsoft announced it will release a record number of patches for its operating systems next week. All told, Microsoft will release 14 security update bulletins, fixing 34 vulnerabilities.

- Offset press maker, Heidelberg of Germany, reported a net loss of 52 million euros and announced that it will lay off an additional 278 workers.

- Better Buys For Business magazine gave out its annual “Editor’s Choice” awards for high speed b/w systems to:
o Konica Minolta bizhub PRO 950
o Konica Minolta bizhub PRO 1051
o Konica Minolta bizhub PRO 1200
o Kodak DigiMaster EX series
o Canon imageRUNNER 7095
o Canon imagePRESS 1100 series
o Ricoh PRO 907/1101/1357
o Oce’ VarioPrint 4110/4120
o Xerox 4127
o Xerox Nuvera series

- ABBYY of Moscow, Russia, maker of OCR (optical character recognition) software, celebrated its 21st anniversary. It also celebrated its 10th anniversary of marketing its products in the U.S. (currently in court battle with Nuance and Iris of Belgium over validity of OCR patents)

- Kofax, maker of middleware software to connect MFPs and scanners to document management applications, announced it won a $2.3 contract from the U.S. military, for use in HR department. (Kofax competes with Nuance eCopy and NSi AutoStore)

- Sharp launched the “Portal Connector” for its OSA (open source architecture) equipped MFPs. Details:
o enables network scanning directly from MFP to key corporate applications
o scan to Microsoft SharePoint
o available to Sharp dealers who belong to the Sharp AIP (authorized integrator program)
o free for M283N, M363N, M453N, M503N, M623N and M753N models
o $349 for other models

- Sharp makes an executive change. John Herrington, formerly of LG Electronics, was named President of the consumer electronics division of Sharp USA, reporting to Toshihiko Tanimoto.

- Anvik, a Hawthorne, N.Y.-based maker of lithography systems, won a patent case against Sharp Corp., which could cost Sharp billions in damages.
o Originally filed in 2007, the suit said Sharp had infringed on Anvik's patents by importing liquid crystal display televisions that were manufactured using a method Anvik had invented.
o Sharp tried to get the case dismissed in 2009, saying that Anvik's patents did not apply because they were methods of use rather than manufacture. But Judge Stephen C. Robinson of the U.S. District Court for the Southern District of New York disagreed.

- Samsung of Korea launched the world’s lowest priced A4 desktop b/w laser MFP, called the SCX-4623W, which will offer 23ppm for $249. Toner cartridge has yield of 1,500 pages (based on 5% per page coverage) and sell for $62.99. Dell announced it will relabel it and call it the Dell 1135N.

- Samsung announced a new option for its laser MFPs, called the SCM SCR3310, which provides a Common Access Card reader for $299.99.

- The State of Washington announced that an audit found that Office Depot overcharged taxpayers $306,017 over three months for office supplies.

- Nuance, owner of eCopy, announced its last quarter’s financials:
o net loss of $1.5 million
o net income grew to $91.3 million from $73.3 million
o operating margin rose to 32.9% from 32.6%
o revenue up 13.4% to $273.2 million
o revenue from healthcare and dictation solutions rose 16.5%
o eCopy division revenue up 102% to $35.8 million

- IBM announced it acquired Datacap Inc., maker of document capture software, and headquartered in Tarrytown, NY.
- More details on the PREO Printelligence software being offered as an option by both Xerox and Toshiba:
o used in conjunction with a managed print services program
o made in Calgary, Canada
o software claims it can predict toner usage/coverage per page for each color before end user actually prints the page
 it can only predict, as it does not actually measure the amount of toner applied, instead counts pixels
o software delivers balloon messages to end users’ PC to drive behavior, so end user is not guaranteed that the toner coverage stated is accurate
o collects data on printing behavior

- Adobe Corp. announced it has promoted David Wahhwani to Senior VP and GM of Creative & Interactive Solutions, reporting directly to COR, Shantanu Narayen. Senior CP John Loiacono has been appointed to lead the new Digital Media Solutions division, also reporting to Narayen.

- Long Island University announced it is giving all incoming freshman free Apple iPad computers. The same offer was also made by the School of Medicine at the University of California – Irvine.

-=Good Selling=-

MFP Weekend Industry Notes 4/26/10

Gathered from Print4Pay Hotel Members from around the world and a few moles in very good places!

- More proof of economic recovery for copiers. The Copier Network of San Leandro, CA has noticed an increasing trend for copier repossessions and other general office equipment in the United States due to the tough economic times. As a nationally established asset recovery company The Copier Network has the privilege of foresight to predict the economy’s coming up’s and down’s. However, recently, Copier Network has noticed a slight decrease in the number of repossession assignments, which may suggest the economy is recovering. (Preliminary forecast for Repo assignments in 2010 is to be about 15% less than 2009.)

- Fujitsu battle with its former president, Kuniaki Nozoe, continues. The latest allegation is that Fujitsu’s board allegedly offered the president “hush money” of $2.9 million, if he would resign quietly.

- Fujitsu launched a computer keyboard that is made with biodegradable plastics, called the KBPC PX ECO keyboard.

- Fujitsu announced it will spend $537.3 million to upgrade its data centers to offer cloud computing (possible price of 30 cents per hour)

- Fujitsu hired John Hanley as Application Division Managing Director, who will be tasked with 3 year plan to double revenue from custom customer applications.

- Pitney Bowes announced it will expand its relationship with Riso to sell the Riso ComColor color inkjet systems. These Olympus made models will be marketed through Pitney Bowes offices nationwide (which may be why Riso is apparently closing its own branches in the U.S.)
- Some customers still prefer the TIFF format for scanning instead of PDF:
o TIFF stands for “Tagged Image File Format”
o works well with CAD programs, and geographic info systems
o file structure is simpler
o originally developed by Aldus Corp, in 1986 (which sold out to Adobe)
o bitmap format
o files are very difficult to alter
o suitable for storing many pages of a single fax in a single file
o better compression algorithms to make files smaller

- Clearwell Systems announced it sold an eDiscovery software package to Wyatt Tarrant & Combs, a 200 attorney law firm with 7 offices in South Central U.S. and Colorado.

- Kodak’s CEO, Antonio Perez, stated that he plans on Kodak generating $250 million to $350 million per year in patent licensing revenue. Details:
o Program actually started during tenure of former Kodak CEO, Dan Carp.
o Kodak invented the digital camera in 1975
o Kodak has reported only one full year of profit since 2004 (in 2007)
o Kodak filed lawsuits against Apple Computer and Research in Motion Ltd. (makers of Blackberry) for patent infringement.
o Apple countersued claiming that Kodak is using its digital processing technologies
o Received $550 million from Samsung to settle lawsuit
o Received $400 million from LG Electronics to settle lawsuit
o Has 30 licensing agreements now in place, including Nokia, Sony, Motorola, etc.

- In the court case “Ghods versus Citicorp”, the judge ruled that just because a copier experienced service problem, the customer (Ghods) is still responsible for making lease payments.

- Nuance announced new features for eCopy ShareScan:
o Document Conversion Extender which enables customers to turn paper documents into fully-formatted Microsoft Word, Excel and RTF (rich text format) files
o The OCR (optical character recognition) engine has been improved to offer 50% more accuracy
o The OCR engine is now 30% more accurate than other middleware solutions
o Forms Processing Extender enables customer to route and process paper forms, including ability to extract data and perform automated database look-ups ($995 per MFP)
o Available OCR SDK (software developer kit) & API (application program interface) making it easier for other software vendors to connect to eCopy
o Support for 3D capture for book scanning
o Export to over 100 formats, including eBook and audio book
o Scan-to-redaction allows keywords or phrases to automatically remove sensitive information with results printed to redacted copy or sent to user as redacted PDF file
o Scan-to-highlight results in a paper-search feature that finds and highlights info hidden within stacks of paper, with highlighted document either printed or sent as PDF

- Zoran Corp. of Sunnyvale, CA, which makes print controllers for many MFP manufacturers, announced a new controller called the “Inferno” offering:
o Uses Linux with Quatro RISC processor
o 10/100/1000BaseT ports
o Zoran also makes controllers for DVD players, digital cameras, cell phones and cable TV boxes.
- Toshiba announced it is launching a new series of hands-on workshops to teach its dealers how to sell Managed Print Services and Professional Services. Details:
o Classes held in Washington DC, Dallas, Irvine & Chicago
o Speakers include employees of Toshiba, HP, Lexmark and Strategy Development
o Launched by Toshiba’s VP of Marketing, Bill Melo
o There is no charge to attend

- Toshiba announced that it won four awards in the 2010 BERTL Readers’ Choice Awards:
o Total Solution Provider in the Overall Manufacturer Award Division
o Environment Sustainability
o Workflow Integration
o Output Quality for the Toshiba e-STUDIO5520c/6520c/6530c series.

- Toshiba expects to report a big loss in the financial year just ended:
o expects a net loss of ¥20 billion (US$215 million) for the fiscal year that ended in March
o Sales are expected to come in at ¥6.38 trillion, which is a slight drop from the ¥6.4 trillion that was predicted in January

- Microsoft released results of a survey that showed:
o Most small and midsize businesses (SMB) will be spending more on IT in 2010
o 64% stated that they will spend more, compared with 23% in 2009
o Overall spending expected to increase 16% over 2009 levels
o 19% expect to use cloud based services
o 74% will use more remote workers
o 52% admitted to storing a document on a company server and never finding it again
o 39% state that their company does not have any guidelines for storing documents

- Copier data security in the news. CBS network TV affiliates across the U.S. are airing investigative reports reporting to the general public that many copiers with hard drives that companies have traded in, still have confidential information stored on the hard drive, that may wind up in the wrong hands when the copiers are remarketed to new customers. Sample of customers that inadvertently exposed data when they traded in their copiers:
o Buffalo, NY Police Department (Toshiba copiers)
o Tommy Bahama stores
o Affinity Health Plan of New York
o The copiers involved were all made prior to 2008, which means they were made before most vendors introduced hard drive encryption or disk overwrite features

- Rochester Software Associates (RSA) won “Best of Show” awards during the current OnDemand trade show in Philadelphia:
o RSA WebCRD Web-to-Print software
o RSA KDKPrint SMARTBOARD conversion software (converts Kodak proprietary format to PS or PDF)
o RSA SurePreview previewsa job onscreen as a finishied product using WebCRD

- Cason Research predicts that digital color page volume in North America will grow from 10% of all digital pages in 2008 to almost 50%, more than 325 billion pages, by 2017.

- According to BuyerZone, here is average street pricing of document management software systems:
o $3,000 for entry level system with less than 10 users
o $6000 for small system with 10+ users
o $25,000 to $80,000 for mid-sized system with up to 100 users
o $500,000 for enterprise level (hundreds of users)

- United Stationers Supply Co., a large nationwide office supply distributor headquartered in Illinois, announced it has made a minority investment in NER Data Corp., which refills toner cartridges, offers generic printer parts, and provides a Managed Print Services program.

- Apple Computer has filed a patent application for a color computer monitor that will use special filters to display CMYK, instead of traditional RGB. Unknown when and if product will actually be launched.

- Rosetta Technologies announced it will sell MICR (magnetic image character recognition) toner that supposedly will work in 90, 110 & 135ppm Ricoh production print b/w copiers.

- Ricoh announced that in Australia, it will resell EFI PrintSmith MIS software, which is used by printshops to manage their business. EFI normally sells this product directly to printshop owners, so Ricoh is testing this in one country, and may offer it in the future in the U.S.

- Ricoh gave out some details about its last fiscal year end performance:
o operating profit is 44% larger than originally forecast due to cost cutting measures (massive layoffs)
o operating profit of $697 million

- Equitrac announced it has hired Eric Rodriquez as its VP of Direct Professional Sales, focusing on selling to the legal vertical market. Details:
o Eric started his career at IKON in Chicago
o Then worked as sales manager for C2 Legal
o Founded and become CEO of Ribstone Systems (since he now left Ribstone, some are reporting that Ribstone is going out of business, which would be bad news for all the law firms in the U.S. that bought Canon imageRUNNERs with Ribstone/MEAP embedded)

- Carlson Marketing reported results of a survey regarding building relationships with customers:
o Average company loses 10-30% of its customers every year
o Average company loses 50% of its customers every 5 years
o 50% of buyers claim they’d never do business with a company again if it took more than one day to resolve one of their customer service issues (i.e. billing, etc.)
o Proactively soliciting feedback from customers provides 15-20% more cross-selling and upselling opportunities
o More than 66% of companies that communicate with their buyers via weekly or monthly newsletters increase loyalty
o Buyers who receive regular contact are 4 times more likely to recommend a business to a friend or collegue

- Samsung puts convict back in his job. Even though he was convicted of criminal tax evasion charges in connection with massive slush fund and bribery network scandal, South Korean President lee Myung-bak pardoned Lee Kun-hee, former Samsung chairman. Samsung announced that he was rehired and given his title back.

- Kyocera has hired Peter Cybuck, formerly of Ricoh and Sharp, to lead new data security initiative for future MFPs.

- Kyocera’s president and CEO, Mike Pietrunti, announced that the company is looking to add dealers in Salt Lake City, Denver, Phoenix and Houston. (it lost dealers it had in last couple of years due to acquisitions)

- More data security issues. A vendor survey of more than 200 hospital executives finds instances of health information data breaches and medical identity theft continue to increase despite new federal regulations like the breach notification rule and the Red Flag rules

o Identity Force, a Framingham, Mass.-based vendor of identity theft prevention services, conducted the survey between March 30 and April 13 among members of the American Hospital Association. The company received e-mail outreach assistance from the AHA, which previously endorsed its services. Survey findings include:
 Some 41.5 percent of responding hospitals have 10 or more data breaches annually, up 121 percent from a similar survey done in 2009. Twenty percent of respondents have at least 20 breaches annually.
 Fifty-six percent of respondents believe the health reform law either will not change or will increase instances of medical identity theft. Yet, 71 percent of the hospitals, on average, investigate fewer than 50 possible cases of misuse of identity each year and 34 percent don't keep good patient ID records.
 Only 15.7 percent of respondents believe they are in good compliance with security provisions of the HITECH Act; 48 percent don't know if their vendors and business associates are in compliance.

-=Good Selling=-

HP's Edgeline Missed the Resurrection Ship

Seems like HP's Edgeline has missed the departure gate for the Resurrection Ship.

Rumors state that the Edgeline is being discontinued....also certain reports indicate that HP will support all MIF's for 5 years.

Bloggers like Greg at Death of the Copier and I have blogged about the Edgeline and from time to time gave our opinions as to why the HP Edgeline is now considered the "New Coke" of the Office Equipment Industry.

In one report it was suggested that the demise of the Edgeline was based on the market still favors laser technology. Maybe, just maybe the Edgeline was ahead of its time. When the Edgeline was released (about May of 2007) most of us were enjoying the fruits of our success and we weren’t overwhelmed with a multifunctional ink system that produced average business color for a penny or two less than its laser counterparts. Also no one was interested is saving a few additional pennies for accent color, hey times were good and HP had to WOW us and they didn't. What about NOW? With the current drag of the recession, cost is first and foremost on everyone’s mind. Why can't the HP Edgeline make a comeback with some minor teaks with speeds and feeds and a much lower MSRP.

A recent release from Lyra "Lyra expects commercial ink jet printer technologies and products to play a significant role in the future growth of the digital imaging industry. Leaders from major OEMs such as Canon/Océ, HP, InfoPrint, Kodak, and Screen as well as print head manufacturers and ink and media suppliers are converging to advance commercial ink jet technology."

I believe the office market is ready for inkjet technology, in a previous blog about Riso's ComColor (ink); we coined the technology as "News Color". Meaning, color documents that are read today and gone tomorrow, why in the world do we need laser color to market our services, products, and or information bearing media if it's going to read today and gone tomorrow.

If you believe that we've been in the Great Recession, then you'll probably agree that all of us will be more conscious of our costs moving forward, who wouldn't. Thus, the emergence of less expensive print technology that will cut costs and help the environment should be a no brainer. Of course MSRP's along with speeds and feeds have to be in line with current laser technology.


-=Good Selling=-

Weekend MFP Industry Notes 2/26/10

Gathered from Print4Pay Hotel Members from around the world and a few moles in very good places!

Hewlett Packard announced its last quarter’s financials:

- Worldwide revenue up 8% to $31.2 billion
- Americas revenue up 9% to $13.6 billion
- GAAP operating profit up 20% to $3 billion
- Enterprise storage and server revenue up 11% to $4.4 billion
- Imaging and Printing Group (printers and MFPs) revenue up 4% to $6.2 billion
- Printer/MFP supplies revenue up 1%
- Total printer units up 16%
- Commercial printer units up 11%
- Laser MFP units down 44% (HP has yet to launch the full line of Canon MFPs)
- Services revenue down 1% to $8.7 billion
- Notebook computer revenue up 25%
- Desktop computer revenue down 16%

- Hewlett Packard announced it is working with Royal Dutch Shell to create seismic sensors to find oil and gas deposits underground.

- At the Photo Marketing Association (PMA) show, Hewlett Packard launched the Photosmart ML1000D minilab. This product (which uses Edgeline color inkjet technology) will be marketed to photolabs (like those in local Walgreens, etc.). HP announced that it already won a large order for this product from Rossman, a chain store in Germany.

- Hewlett Packard announced ban on exports of non-working electronics to developing countries. (dead HP printers and MFPs can no longer be dumped in third world countries)

- Canon is preparing to launch 5 new b/w A3 MFPs, the imageRUNNER 2500 series. Details:
- will range from 20 to 45ppm
- will not utilize the new ADVANCE print controller technology
- will based on current imageRUNNER IR-3220 platform

- Canon filed a lawsuit that may hurt IKON. Details:
- Filed in Virginia Eastern District Court
- Patent infringement claim against Densigraphix of Montreal, Canada (office in New York)
- Densigraphix makes toner cartridges for Canon-made laser printers and MFPs
- IKON, a division of Ricoh, apparently recently became Densigraphix’s largest customer when IKON was cut off from buying toner from Canon when it sold out to Ricoh
- The patent in question, #7647012, describes design of a toner cartridge for a copier
- Densigraphix toners sell for 30% less than those made by Canon
- If Canon wins the lawsuit, IKON could be forced to buy supplies from Canon, most likely at list price

- Lockheed Martin won a $500 million contract from the U.S. Census bureau to scan in approximately 160 million paper census forms. Lockheed will use 45 each of the IBML ImageTrac IV high speed scanners. The scanners will be installed in Baltimore, Phoenix and Jeffersonville, IN.

- Kodak announced that it signed a new loan agreement with Citicorp and Banc of America giving it access to $200 million. With the new funds, it paid down $125 million in debt to other lenders.
- Kodak announced that it signed a multi-year contract with Ricoh.

Details:
- Ricoh & IKON branches will now be authorized to sell both Kodak Digimaster production b/w systems and NexPress production color systems
- Contract also includes Kodak Document Imaging Solutions and Unified Workflow Solutions
- Includes CREO print servers and PRINERGY production print workflow solutions
- IKON and Ricoh will offer service contracts for Digimaster products, but only Kodak can service the NexPress product
- Kodak claims to have 3,000 service technicians total in 120 countries
- Unknown how many RBS or IKON locations will have these products on display
- IKON, a division of Ricoh, at its recent open house at its San Antonio branch, had a guest speaker, David Cameron of Photizo Group, give a lecture on advantages of managed print services contracts. Also on hand was VP of Marketing for the San Antonio Spurs basketball team. Host was Craig Ruhland, VP of Sales for IKON.


- Ricoh now shipping the Aficio MP 4001 and 5001 digital b/w laser MFPs offering:
go here for Ricoh Aficio 4001 and 5001 'Spec Review"

- Ricoh announced pricing for the PRO C720, which is 72ppm version of the C900 production color system. More on this here P4P Suites

- Ricoh is preparing to replace the current Aficio MP C6000 and C7500 color MFPs with the new C6001 and C7501 featuring:

- C6001 has top speed of 60ppm for color or b/w
- C7501 offers 70ppm color and 75ppm b/w speeds
- 1200x1200dpi
- Optional EFI Fiery
- Scan speeds up to 82ppm
- pricing and ship date not announced


- Konica Minolta Europe announced it is offering an option for its MFPs to allow for wireless remote care:
- Partnered with KPM and Jasper Wireless
- MFP can be equipped with a KPN Global SIM with transmits data from MFP to Konica Minolta service center
- Can transmit supply order, service call and meter read
- Countries included in wireless service option from KPN are Netherlands, Germany, Belgium, Spain & France
- Pricing not announced
- Konica Minolta UK (England) announced it will resell fax server software from Avanquest Solutions.

- DocuLex of Florida, maker of document management software, announced it won “Best Value for Price” recognition from BERTL.

- Qoppa Software of Atlanta, GA announced that it is offering PDF Studio 6.2 for Google Docs, allowing end users to create and edit PDF from Google Docs documents. MSRP of $95.00

- Equitrac announced that the new version 5 of Equitrac Professional cost recovery software will provide a “Scan to DMS” feature, allowing scanning directly into a document management system.

- Nuance Communications announced it has acquired MacSpeech, a maker of voice recognition software for Mac computers

- Solution software maker, Open Text Corp., (headquartered in Waterloo, Ontario, Canada), announced it plans on making multiple acquisitions in 2010. (Open Text in past bought Captaris RightFax)

- Nuance launched a free, downloadable PDF reader software, called “Nuance PDF Reader”. Nuance’s software is only 18MB, as compared to Adobe Acrobat Reader which is 45MB. It also is temporarily allowing end users free access to its cloud computing offering “Nuance PDF Document Conversion Service”, which takes MS Word and Excel files and converts them to PDFs.

- In a survey of businesses in Europe by BERTL, end users rated their favorite suppliers of managed print services. In order, here are top choices:

- Hewlett Packard
- Canon
- Xerox
- Ricoh

- Roger Mozda, of Taunton, MA, was arrested for attempting to use a fake $10 bill that he made on a color copier. Mr. Mozda has already served jail time in the past for the same crime.

- Kyocera announced it won “Excellent Value” recognition from Office Products Analyst for its FS-C5100, C5200 & C5300 desktop color printers.

- Kyocera (fka Kyoto Ceramic Company) announced it has designed a thermal printhead, the KLE series, for printing on rigid ID cards or credit cards in full color at 300dpi, at 50mm per second, faster than any other competitor.

- Toshiba announced it has completed its acquisition of Fujitsu’s hard drive business. As a result of the acquisition, Toshiba launched a 2.5” drive that can hold up to 600GB.

- Toshiba announced it will resell Digital Rights Management software from Fasoo, which will provide end users ability to encrypt and password protect documents. Pricing unannounced.

- Toshiba announced it now has supplied 35 hydro power generators to the country of Columbia, and will deliver 3 more by end of 2013.

- Staples, the office supply superstore chain, announced it will now start selling IT services (to compete with Best Buy’s Geek Squad and others). The company’s VP of Finance, Joe Kalinoski, stated that the new Staples Technology Solutions division has:

- 400 employees
- access to certified specialists for Cisco Systems, Citrix, Linux, etc.
- onsite and remote support
- desktop support for PC, Macs and Linux devices
- managed print services
- data center assessments
- target market is SMB (companies with 1 to 250 employees)
- Candy Murphy is now CP of Staples Contract Technology Solutions
- result of Staples’ acquisition of Thrive Networks of Boston, MA (which has 90 employees in MA)

(Thrive Networks was started in basement by three people in 2003)

- More troubles for Canon’s attempt to buy Oce’. Sparinvest, a Danish investor group which holds Oce’ stock, announced it will join with Hermes and Orbis (two other investor groups) in opposing the bid, in an attempt to force Canon to increase its acquisition offer. Together, the three groups hold 18.5% of Oce’s stock. So far, Canon has purchased 28% of the shares.

- KnowledgeLake Inc., which develops products for Microsoft SharePoint users, announced it is partnering with ReadSoft of New Orleans, to deliver automated invoice processing and document classification to SharePoint ECM (electronic content management) market.

- Fujitsu announced an option for its SnapScan desktop scanners, that allow users to scan directly into EverNote. Details on EverNote:

- data storage using could computing
- basic service is free, but end user must view advertisements when they store or retrieve files from their personal repository accessed via the Web
- For $45 per year, there are no ads, and can store up to 500 megabytes

- Fujitsu and Canon announced that they will partner in Japan to offer cloud computing-based managed services for printing and IT equipment. The joint program will bundle Canon’s Managed Document Services (managed print services) and Fujitsu’s Workplace LCM (managed IT services) to businesses in Japan. If successful, the company may launch in other parts of the world. Pricing unannounced.

- Fujitsu announced that its scanners can now connect to fScanX software from Elevated Software Development. The software supports speeds up to 90ipm, and offers ability to automatically run common tasks without writing code.

- According to research firm, NelsonHall, the document management services market (which includes managed print services) will grow to more than $45 billion worldwide by 2013.

- Sharp announced that it may close its LCD plant in Barcelona area of Spain due to high labor costs. This will impact 430 union employees, as production would shift to factories in China.

- ExactCODE of Berlin, Germany announced production scanning software for the Apple Macintosh computers. The new ExactScan 2 software can process up to 120 images per minute with color correction, OCR, auto crop, deskew and compression, and supports up to 200 different document scanners.

- Astro-Med Inc. announced it won a $1.4 million contract from Boeing to make thermal printers that will mount in airplane cockpits.

- Pitney Bowes announced that its Government Solutions division won a facilities management contract from the Department of Justice. The length of the contract, its value, and amount of MFPs included were not announced.

- Global Industry Analysts Inc. predicts that the US photocopier maker will reach 1.5 million units by 2015. This includes all segments.

- Giant offset press makers, Heidelberg & Komori, announced that they will NOT have booths at the upcoming Graph Expo show in Chicago, due to declining sales. Show is held 10/3-6/2010.

- In an article in FORTUNE magazine, titled “Paper Chase”, prints produced on A3 b/w copiers are expected to drop 50% by the year 2013.

- IBM announced it has acquired Intelliden of Menlo Park CA, which makes network management software. IBM claims that 60% of all network outages are caused by manual configuration errors. IBM has made more than 50 acquisitions since 2003.

- Fujitsu changed its mind and apparently will now have a booth showing off its scanners

- Kodak also changed its mind and will have a scanner display

- Canon, IBML, BancTec, OPEX & Plustek will also be showing their newest scanners

- AnyDoc Software, Kofax & ReadSoft have pulled out of event

- Recent survey of businesses conducted by AIIM revealed:
- 62% of important paper documents are still archived as paper
- 25% are photocopied beforehand “just in case”
- Less than 33% of paper originals are destroyed after scanning
- 70% feel that paper records are needed for legal reasons (which has not been the case for 20 years)

-=Good Selling=-