Daily Managed Print Service Industry Notes from Around the World! 2/15/2012

Lexmark is ditching its three year old ValuePrint channel programme and replacing it with a solutions-focused set-up dubbed Business Solutions Dealer, which it claims will be have a tighter fit with its "high-value approach".The new programme has been designed to include fully managed print services and work-flow enhancing solutions, and will also offer new software and dedicated support designed to help partners take a more solutions-focused approach, Lexmark said.....read more here


TAMPA, Fla., Feb 15, 2012  -- Global Imaging Systems (GIS), A Xerox Company, has acquired Iowa-based company, RK Dixon, a leading provider of IT services, copiers, printers and managed print services with locations in seven Iowa and Illinois cities. The acquisition furthers GIS' coverage of central Illinois and eastern....read more here

Not all that long ago, computer printers were like old style telex machines as seen in the recent movie ‘Tinker, Tailor, Soldier Spy’. These rather noisy ‘line printers’ cost several thousand euros each while the ink cartridges they used cost just a few euro. Today, the opposite is the case, with high quality, affordable printers available from as little as €49 while a full set of ink cartridges cost more than the printer itself! What does this mean for the consumer? Read more here

MENLO PARK, Calif. — February 14, 2012 — Ricoh Innovations, Inc. (“RII”), a Silicon Valley-based subsidiary of Ricoh Company, Ltd., which develops innovative technologies and new business opportunities for Ricoh, announced today the formation of Ricoh Innovations Private Limited (“RIPL”) in India. RIPL, which will have its headquarters and first R&D facility in Bangalore, extends the operation of RII to address the rapidly growing India market...read more here

-=Good Selling=-

Weekend Copier & MFP Updates for 1/29/2012

Superbowl week is upon us GO GIANTS!!
For those who delve deep into the forums, there is so much awesome content from the p4p members.Please make sure you read all of the new links and then pick and choose what interests you! For those readers that are not members please use this one time lifetime FREE registration link!

Print4Pay Hotel's Production Print Certification Testing!  That's right now posted on P4P U Certifications & Testing are the first five tests in a total of ten tests. There will be a new test posted each month for the next five months!

Please take advantage of the sales documents, quotes, proposals, rfp's, rfq's, uploads, leads, p4p library, downloads and all of the additional forum features that are enabled with a Premium Membership!

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-=Good Selling=-

This Week in Xerox "TWIX Notes"

- Xerox scientist, Elliott Eklund, died when he struck a tree while riding his snowboard. The 48 year old man had worked for Xerox for 16 years, and had 19 patents, including some for inkjet printhead technology.

- Xerox announced it won a copier bid from the Galesburg, IL school district, where it claims it will save the school district $119,000 over the life of the contract. Xerox was the incumbent.

- The United States Climate Action Partnership (USCAP), a lobbying group pushing the cap & trade bill, and promoter of controversial man-made global warming theories, announced that Xerox did not renew its membership to the group.

- Xerox advertised some of its recent large managed print service contract wins:
- University of British Columbia in Canada (6 year contract)
- Hobart & William Smith College in Geneva, NY reduced devices from 550 to 81.
- Rotterdam University of Netherlands with 15% reduction in operating costs
- Canberra Institute of Technology in Australia reduced devices from 494 to 199, and cut operating costs 47%
- Total devices under MPS contract now at 1.5 million worldwide

- Xerox announced it named Mrs. Liz Stafford to Senior VP of Western Division in U.S. over 1,800 employees in 11 states. She started with Xerox in 1980 as a rep May, 1980, in San Diego branch.

- Xerox announced that its ACS division won a 8 year, $61 million contract from the State of Pennsylvania to process child support payments.

- Xerox released more details about the revolutionary fusing technology, “Flash Fusing” that is used in the Xerox 490/980 roll-fed production color system:
- Also used in Xerox 650/1300 b/w system and the Xerox 495 b/w system
- Melts toner to paper at top speed of 8.3 color prints per second
- Same speed as blinking of human eye (2 to 4 tenths of a second)
- Does not use pressure, and does not come in contact with toner or paper
- Uses lamps which flash at 2,000 times per second
- The lamps are filled with Xenon gas
- There are 8 total Xenon lamps in printer
- Lamps are similar to those used in new luxury autos
- The special toner used responds to the high intensity light and melts to paper

- Quantum Digital, a print for pay that claims to be Xerox’s number one customer in the U.S., will have a booth at the upcoming national convention in New Orleans for Keller Williams real estate agents. The company sells output from its fleet of Xerox iGen3 color systems.

- Xerox promoted Dan Cooper to Executive VP of Field Operations for its Global Imaging division. Previously, he was president of Global’s Electronic Systems on Virginia. Replacing him is Kurt Schmelz and Anthony Lane as co-presidents.

- Xerox recently had its national sales meeting in Orlando, FL, and new CEO, Ursula Burns made following comments:
- “It’s all about growth. It’s all about getting bigger”
- “The accolades I get for doing absolutely nothing are amazing. I’ve been named to every list, literally, since I became CEO. What have I done? In the first 30 days, I was named to a list of the most impressive XYZ. The accolades are good for five minutes, but then it takes the shine off the real story. I just happen to be the person standing up at this point representing Xerox.”
- Xerox has “terminal niceness….we are really, really, really nice”
- “When we’re in the family, you don’t have to be as nice as when you’re outside of the family. I want us to stay civil and kind, but we have to be frank and the reason we can be frank is because we are all in same family”
- She describes meetings at Xerox where someone presents, and others just listen; “And then the meeting ends and we leave and go Man that wasn’t true. I’m like Why didn’t you say that in the meeting?”
- “One of the things that I was told early on is that you should never let them see you sweat. I remember hearing that and saying Oh my God! I think that they have to see you sweat.”
- “Fearlessness doesn’t mean recklessness. This is something I live by all the time and one of the things I want to change.”
- “Decide. Do things”
- “What is it that you see in this company that you love-that you can love-you can grow to love?”
- “People would come in to me and say You put me in this assignment. I know how to run the place now. Thank you. Can I go to the next one? I say Well how about all the stuff you owe us? How about getting settled in for a little while longer and then start to transform it?”
- “You have to learn and you have to be curious. You have to perform at your best. You have to worry about the things you can control. Don’t become a victim.”
- “Stuff happens to you and then there’s stuff that you happen to.”

-=Good Selling=-

Comdoc Global Xerox "P4P Feedback"

When the news hit with the Comdoc Global/Xerox deal the P4P Hotel experienced over 1,000 page views and 50 responses, I'd like to share some of the responses from Print4Pay Hotel members.

Wow! Never saw this coming.

That's huge!!!

WOW...... that all I have to say......

I was flabbergasted when Mike called me this AM!! Nothing surprises me anymore! Oh, that's got to hurt Ricoh big time.

Canon seems to be going the route of signing up new dealers up to this point, which is likely being done quietly.

and the beat goes on...The industry is going to continue to contract and over the next 3-5 years...

Not to insult my Ricoh sales brethren but as a longtime ComDoc employee/owner the overwhelming majority of the people here look at this as a very, very positive thing.

Ricoh will surely utilize IKON to go after the COMDOC base and probably not add any Independent Dealers in the Ohio and upstate NY marketplace.

Hrmm. Since Global is owned by Xerox and Xerox is a public company, won't the costs for this purchase be listed in the annual report?

The purchase price is now "known" on the street, and it's enough to say that the poll above picked the best of the available answers, though several additional higher options would have been helpful.

Just the tip of the iceberg in the quotes. But the purchase hit home for many dealers, reps and Ricoh. It's my understanding that all employees were owners! Kudos to all of you for building such a fine company and I hope all of you were rewarded with a great purchase price!!

-=Good Selling=-

Top Ten MFP "Predictions for 2009"

Here's my top ten for 2009, believe it not, I do not think there will be anymore acquisitions by the big boys.

1. Canon and HP will develop a cross marketing venture.

2. Introduction of the first printer centric A4 90ppm system or faster.

3. Panasonic will drop out of the MFP businesss.

4. Canon Business Systems USA will open direct branches to compete with Ikon.

5. Ricoh will spend less on R & D due to increased debt.

6. Independent dealerships merges will be the new FAD.

7. A new holding company will emerge to acquire copier dealerships, in essence a renewal of IKON, Danka and Global.

8. HP will start buying Dealers in key market areas.

9 Printer Management will increase in popularity, thus starting the trend for reps to be paid on clicks and not boxes.

10. Copier Technicians will unionize.

-=Good Selling=-

MFP Wars "Death of the Independent Dealer"

The Copier business was once a wonderful business, where the manufacturers only sold their goods through Authorized Dealers. We had competition, however it was healthy because everyone was on the same playing field. The Dealers who sold the most got the best pricing, and the Dealers who sold the lease just had to grin and bear and that's the way it was.

Over time, the business model matured and companies like Danka, and Alco (Ikon) emerged to buy some of the largest or most profitable dealerships in the nation. At one time Alco (Ikon) was a distributor for Sharp copiers, and then one day Alco (Ikon) dropped Sharp and the Japanese Manufacturers shook in their boots. From what I remember, and I could be wrong, Sharp lost about 80% of their North America distribution in one day. Every since then the Japanese manufacturers have been buying dealers to preserve market share.

Which brings me to a line in Tommy Boy:

Tommy: [after watching Ray Zalinski car commercial] Hmmm. He seems like a nice guy.

Richard Hayden: This is the guy trying to buy the company, not to mention put you out on the street, and all you can say is,[sarcastically]

Richard Hayden: "Hmmm, he seems like a nice guy!"

While we sleep manufacturers seem act like nice guys and continue to buy the channel and under cut our pricing. we too could soon be out on the street!

Take a look at Canon, they stand to lose almost 600 million or more in sales in North America! What are they going to do? In talking to friends the last few days, they are courting dealers in droves to become a Canon Dealer, and if that doesn't work look for Canon to start acquiring dealerships in markets where there is no representation from Canon Business Solutions.

Word on the street is that every dealership is now worth more just because of the Ricoh purchase of IKON.

Copier manufacturers along with print manufacturers make money by putting ink on paper, and at this point in time it seems they don't care what they have to do to protect their channel. Just recently, I ran across a deal from RBS in NJ for a Print4Pay account, where RBS was losing 45,000 dollars in order to get the clicks! Am I missing something here??? RBS guaranteed single clicks for 11x17 at .06 and .0042 for 11x17. Hey, guarantees are for sissies right.

In the months ahead there will be many dealers bought thus further eroding the dealer channel. Before you know it, well it's tough to compete now, it's gonna get a lot tougher down the road.

Personally, I can't see how the small dealers can stay in business, mergers of smaller dealerships will be the next fad, thus enabling these companies to be bought by the likes of Canon, TABS, Global, etc....

Maybe Canon will buy HP? The more I think of it, we may see an agreement from Canon and HP to market each others products. Anyway you slice it, it seems the writing is on the wall for Dealerships!

btw, Tommy Boy is one of my favorite sales movie...God Bless Chris Farley!

-=Good Selling=-

MFP Wars "KonicaMinolta Buys Danka USA"

Will KonicaMinolta now join the ranks of Xerox, Canon & Ricoh. Some think they are there already. If you haven't heard KonicaMinolta bought Danka USA today, just a few weeks after Ricoh announced that they had acquired Danka (Europe).

Danka founded in 1977 in Tampa, Florida as and entrepreneurial venture. By 1986, Danka had become the leading office imaging distributor in the US. A year ago the stock traded for $1.37 per share and yesterday the stock was down to .22 cents a share. The total purchase price seems to be $240 million, hardware and supply sales for the last four quarters is about 200 million.

As an outsider looking in, KonicaMinolta products have been getting stronger and stronger, saturation of dealers and direct branches seems to be balanced. KonicaMinolta never cut their ties with Global, while Canon & Ricoh walked away. Not sure if they lost business here, I would tend to think that they gained business during the Xerox transition process. I now believe KonicaMinolta can be a major vendor for quite some time.

WOW, where does this leave the likes of Toshiba, HP and Canon? Will Toshiba do the same as Canon and Ricoh did with Global? Will HP fold and Canon also fold up their tents? My thoughts, HP will stay put if they can, Toshiba is continuing to buy dealerships in an attempt to maintain market share and I think they'll get out. But, what about Canon? They took quite a hit from Global, now Danka, and Ikon which was pretty much Canon is now three major product lines, Canon, Ricoh and Kyocera.

Its now a question of WHO has the bucks and the brawn to buy IKON! It will happen, it's just a question of when. Who can do? HP can, Canon can, I'm not too sure any of the players could pull off a purchase of IKON. Just a guess, but it would probably take at least 3 billion to pull it off.