This Week in Ricoh "TWIR Notes"

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

- IKON, a division of Ricoh, won a large managed print services bid at a Pennsylvania university. Clarion University replaced 540 Hewlett Packard printers with 27 color MFPs and 44 b/w MFPs. Total volume per year is 6 million b/w pages and 250,000 color pages. The university decided to make a change when it realized it was spending $60,000 per year just on print cartridges.

- According to survey conducted by Ricoh, the following responses were collected from businesses in countries who are trying to cut back on printing waste:
- France = 43.5%
- Italy = 42.7%
- Germany = 41.7%
- England = 38.5%
- Only 33% of companies claim to have implemented a strategy
- Total spent on documents per year in Europe = 14 billion euros
- 32% of business owners allow employees to do what they like

- Ricoh announced it is now shipping “biomass” black toner for some of its copiers in Japan. This is a test to try to replace traditional petroleum based toner resin.

- Are Ricoh dealers providing their customers with new parts or used parts? Equipment Brokers Unlimited of Van Nuys, CA announced that it is expanding its used Ricoh parts division due to increased sales of used parts to dealers. The company claims that used parts are 40%-80% less expensive than buying new parts from Ricoh.

- Ricoh announced it has sold an Aficio PRO C900 production color system to Genova Diagnostics of Ashville, NC, which prints out lab test reports for medical clinics.

- IKON, a division of Ricoh, announced it will hold a “Graphic Arts Digital Discovery” event for production color prospects on 12/8 at its Indianapolis, IN branch. Sessions will include Adobe InDesign, Illustrator, Photoshop, Acrobat and Enfocus PitStop.

-=Good Selling=-

This Week in Ricoh "TWIR Notes"

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

- In an effort to increase sales, a Canon & Ricoh dealer in England, named ABT Office Supplies, announced that it will now sell its copiers at cost. The only catch is that customer must sign up for a minimum annual service/supply contract. (wonder what Canon and Ricoh think about one of their dealers revealing what wholesale cost is…….)

- Ricoh reported that during the last quarter, its net profit declined 89.5%

- Ricoh announced its IKON division sold a Ricoh Aficio PRO C900 production color system to Alphagraphics of Fort Worth, Texas.

- According to some industry authors, Ricoh is planning on launch a replacement for the C900 in summer of 2010 that will NOT use fuser oil, and use polymerized toner instead of pulverized toner. Also supposedly in the works is a 120ppm color unit.

- Ricoh is touting the fact that its Aficio PRO C900 production color system won a “5 Star” award from Business Equipment Research & Testing Labs (BERTL)

- IKON, a division of Ricoh, announced it won a bid to provide scanning services for the Pittsburg County Assessors office. The winning bid was $16,950 to scan 226,000 documents.

-=Good Selling=-

This Week in Ricoh "TWIR Notes"

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

- Ricoh announced it won a bid from AREVA Inc. AREVA is a nuclear power equipment maker, with facilities in 43 countries. Details of the contract were not announced.

- Ricoh announced it now has a special discount pricing program for members of NAPL/NAQP, allowing it to increase its sales of production print systems to printshops in the U.S.

- Ricoh announced it sold another Ricoh Aficio PRO C900 production color system. This time it placed a unit at Grover Printing, a Consolidated Graphics printshop in Houston, Texas.

- In Japan, Ricoh launched the “Pretend You Are a Copier” program, which enables children to experience 6 copier processes through experiments.

-=Good Selling=-

This Week in Ricoh "TWIR Notes"

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

Apparently Ricoh’s Regional Vice President, in charge of wholesale in the Midwest, Chuck Parr, has left the company.

Promos that Ricoh is apparently offering through its branches in the 3rd quarter of 2008
- Zero % finance leases
- Reps can waive up to 6 months of remaining payments of existing customers’ lease.
- C900 program of $0.05 for color clicks and $0.0055 for b/w clicks

Ricoh announced that it will recycle copiers in Japan, England and Ireland.

Details:
- Each machine is stripped down to chassis
- Replace all lifetime parts
- Fit all mods and firmware updates
- Respray external panels
- Are priced 25% less than equivalent new models
- Have either “RC” or “R” in the model name to denote that they were used copiers that were recycled

-=Good Selling=-

This Week in Ricoh "TWIR Notes"

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

IKON, a division of Ricoh, announced it has sold a Ricoh Aficio PRO C900 production color laser system to an AlphaGraphics location in Fort Worth, Texas.

Ricoh has filed a lawsuit against Okidata. Apparently, the two have been negotiating since 2006 in regards to use of patents that Ricoh claims are used in Okidata MFPs and printers. Ricoh claims that 8 of its patents are involved, and the lawsuit seeks to stop sales of Okidata MFPs and printers in the U.S., unless Okidata pays the license fees.

Ricoh announced it has certified, and will offer an embedded software solution from Notable Solutions Inc. (NSI)
- Offering the new NSI AutoStore 5.0
- Allows documents scanned into Ricoh Aficio MFPs to be automatically routed
- OCR on the fly

Ricoh’s CEO, Shiro Kondo, announced the company’s support of the Copenhagen Communique on Climate Change (i.e. global warming prevention)

Ricoh’s InfoPrint division (formerly a division of IBM) announced it now offers a full line of variable data, and transpromo solutions to bundle with its printers and MFPs, including products from following software firms:

- Enfocus
- GMC
- IoFlex
- Objectif Lune
- Press-Sense
- Rochester Software Associates (RSA)
- Ultimate

Ricoh now shipping the BK5010e Production Booklet Maker option for its production print devices featuring:

- Actually made by Plockmatic Corp.
- Can be on-line or off-line
- Can make booklets for up to 30 sheets (20lb. bond)
- Optional BF5010e Book Fold Unit provides a square fold to booklet
- Staples are 5000 per cartridge for $102.00
- Handles up to 12”x18” paper
- Optional TR5010e Trimmer has air jets to assist with trim waste

-=Good Selling=-

TWIR "This Week in Ricoh"!

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

Industry authors claim that Ron Potesky, former Senior VP of Marketing for Ricoh, will be taking a job as President of Pantone Corp.

Ricoh’s InfoPrint division launched a new controller (not based on Fiery), for when it installs a relabeled Ricoh Pro C900 production color system into a data center that is running AFP protocol.

IKON, a division of Ricoh, announced it has settled a lawsuit it filed against the City of Jacksonville, FL. Details:
- IKON was seeking over $5 million, but settled for $3,077,519.00
- was for use of copiers it provided to the city’s library system
- original cost per copy lease contract was awarded to IKON in 2000
- in June 2005, the city had stopped paying IKON, as it was disputing IKON’s billings
- City claims that the lease was signed by a City employee that did not have decision making authority
- included 48 copiers, even though the library system only has 21 locations
- Even though it was not getting paid, IKON did not stop servicing and supplying the copiers
- The City gained title to the equipment as part of the settlement

Ricoh announced a new lease promo to boost sales of its Aficio PRO C900 production color system. Details:
- Must be leased through Ricoh Financial, CIT, DLL, Wells Fargo or GE Capital
- First choice is end user can choose an interest free 36 month FMV lease
- Second choice is a 60 month FMV lease with only 5.9% interest
- If other products are on the lease, or a trade-in/rebate is involved, must use a blended rate

Ricoh announced it will now offer nQueue BillBack as an embedded solution for its MFPs.

-=Good Selling=-

TWIR "This Week in Ricoh"

Special thanx to Print4Pay Hotel members from around the world and a few moles!

IKON, a division of Ricoh, will have a booth at the upcoming ILTA Conference, for the legal community, and be showing Ricoh MFPs bundled with document management solutions from OmTool AccuRoute, according to IKON’s VP of Legal Enterprise Solutions, Mark Davey.

Ricoh announced it won a bid to supply MFPs and DocuLex Archive Studio document management software to Lake County Water Authority in Orlando, FL.

Ricoh Product Manager, Frank Elchert, launched the Personal Paperless Document Manager optional solution software for its MFPs:
- Allows users to combine scanned documents with MS Word, Excel or PowerPoint content
- Based on Nuance Communications OmniPage OCR software
- Can customize scanning menus on the copier’s LCD panel
- PDF data compression
- 5 seat license for $1499.95, 25 seats for $7124.76, 50 seats for $13,499.55
- price does not include annual software maintenance fees

-=Good Selling=-

TWIR "This Week in Ricoh" 8/25/09

Gathered from media sources from around the world, and a few moles!

Isn't this a photo-copier brand?! In the early days, RICOH made precision instruments like watches . This RICOH 21J Automatic has rounded edges, making the watch look bigger than fact. The doom cystal also adds to the depth and volume of the watch. There is a raised red flower above 6 o'clock. It looks like a Lotus, a symbol of purity rising among the filth in Buddhism.

Ricoh announced it has renamed its IKON location in Denmark to Ricoh Business Solutions

Ricoh’s IKON office in Grand Rapids, Michigan, announced it won the Muskegon Public Schools bid. The contract is for 45 copiers for a total of $191,000.00.

According to some industry authors, Ricoh’s Senior Vice President of Marketing, Ron Potesky, is leaving the company to pursue other interests.

Ricoh announced it will sponsor the Women’s British Open golf tournament.

The new Ricoh president, Shiro Kondo gave an interview in Japanese magazine, The Nikkei Business Daily:

- Taking steps to reinvent its copier business strategy to turn itself into a provider of business solutions
- Seeks a 10% increase in sales and tripling increase in profit in 2 years
- “We cannot hope to keep growing if we stick to our hardware oriented strategy”
- Now employs 1,000 systems engineers worldwide
- New global marketing headquarters is run by CFO, Zenji Miura
- “If we don’t change, we will follow path of General Motors”
- “Anyone not ready to give their all should leave”
- As of March 2009, only 20,000 of the Canon’s that IKON had in its MIF had been
replaced by Ricoh product
- IKON still has 300,000 Canon machines in its MIF


-=Good Selling=-

TWIR "This Week in Ricoh"

Ricoh announced that it has sold one of its Aficio Pro 900 production color systems to a print shop in Des Moines, Iowa. Its IKON office in the area, sold one to Colorfx Inc., which is now using the system to produce variable data direct applications.

Ricoh announced that some of its products received accolades from Business Equipment Research & Testing Labs (BERTL):
- 5 star ratings given to MP C2550, C3300 & C5000 color laser MFPs
- BEST award given to C2550 & C5000

Ricoh announced more details about its new b/w production print systems (906EX, 1106EX, 1135EX) where it now expects end users to perform some of the service, under the “Trained Customer Replacement Units (TCRU). Details:
- Advertised as allowing end users to minimize downtime
- End users receive one hour of on-site training to learn how to replace the TCRU parts
- Consists of 8 different parts including; fuser section, fuser cleaning web, OPC drum, corona wires/grids,
waste toner receptacle, etc.

Details on the finishers offered for the new Ricoh b/w production print models:
- The GB2000 perfect binder can glue bind up to 200 sheets of paper, and can trim 3 edges of book
- booklet size of either 8.5”x11” or 8.5” x 5.5”
- uses tray on top to insert cover material
- top speed of 20 booklets per hour
- unit takes 6.5 minutes to reach melt temperature
- maximum paper weight handling of 163gsm for body, up to 300gsm for cover
- does not support use of coated/glossy stock
- the optional EFI Fiery does not support this option
- The RB5000 ring binder can punch and bind up to 100 sheets of paper
- can only use 8.5” x 11” paper
- when loading ring material, must choose either 50 sheet or 100 sheet ring material
- can not load both 50 & 100 rings at same time
- choice of either white or black ring material
- is not three ring, but instead punches 21 holes, and rings resemble comb binding
- when using 100 sheet bind, top speed of 30 booklets per hour
- when using 50 sheet bind, top speed of 55 booklets per hour
- output drawer can hold up to 11 booklets maximum
- ring material replacement will produce 75 booklets
- maximum paper weight that can be used is 216gsm
- The BK5000 booklet maker can stitch up to 15 sheets of paper
- The BK5010 booklet maker can stitch up to 30 sheets of paper

TWIR "This Week in Ricoh"

IKON’s warehouse in Orange County, Florida, had its roof ripped off and trailers upended during a severe storm last week. 16,792 copiers were exposed to rain.

"Hope they had insurance, and were these lease returns?, OMG what a mess that would be"

IKON, a division of Ricoh, announced that it will now resell Fasoo Solutions.
- IKON VP of Solutions, Dan Nero, made the announcement
- Fasoo based in South Korea
- Provides digital rights management (DRM)
- Uses encryption technology to secure customer’s information

"The first thing I thought of when I read this was Gazoo from the Flintstones, he was the space man with the rather large helmet and the antenna on the top. Mr. Customer we'd like to introduce you to FASOO, kinda has a ring to it eh!


Ricoh launched a new program called “The Total Green Office Solution” claiming it will reduce efficiencies for customers.

Details:
- replace current equipment with “Green” equipment from Ricoh that have low emissions
- improve energy efficiency, as new Ricoh MFPs use less energy that old models
- fleet consolidation
- Ricoh’s polymerized toner (called PxP) uses less heat to fuse
- Toner collection and recycling program

"Ya, ya and ya, oh bother another Green Solution and another promise of we'll reduce your carbon footprint, give me a break!"

Ricoh announced new details of its Technoforce network services program:
- Block of Time ($105 per hour)
- Annual Bronze 40 contract with 10 hours per quarter of on-demand remote helpdesk
or field technician for $3800
- Annual Silver 80 contract with 20 hours per quarter remote or field technician for $7200
- Annual Gold 160 contract with 40 hours per quarter remote or field technician for $13,600

Ricoh announced it has made another dealer acquisition.

Details:
- Purchased Automated Business Products, a Savin dealer
- Based in Salt Lake City, UT
- Owners were Lee Christensen and Mike Archer, who will stay in charge of the new wholly owned subsidiary and will take over the current Ricoh branch in SLC.- This current ABP was founded in 1999 and has 63 employees- The original ABP was founded by the Archer family and had locations in Utah, Colorado and others, before selling out to IKON.

"Another Ricoh Direct Branch coming to a town near you, now you can benefit buy getting Ricoh equipment for next to nothing"

-=Good Selling=-