Copier Industry News

• Also offering the imageCLASS MF264dw II and MF262dw II
  • b/w laser A4 models
  • Top speed of 30ppm
  • Base MSRPs of $229 and $199 respectively

Canon launches new scanners

• Now offering the imageFORMULA DR-G2140 and DR-G2110
• Compliant with new FADGI regulation (Federal Agencies Digital Guidelines Initiatives)
• Document feeder scans both sides of original at same time
  • Top scan speeds of 140ipm/110ipm or 70opm/55opm respectively
  • Holds up to 500 originals
• USB 3.1 and 10/100/1000BaseT ports standard

Toshiba wins award from BLI

• Won a BLI 2023-2024 Pacesetter Award in Logistics for MFPs and label printers
• Cited examples such as:
  • Touchscreen overlay for dust protection
  • Steel rails in paper drawers
  • Reinforced hinges on document feeders and doors
  • Customizable user interface

Toshiba wins large MPS contract

• Award from State University of New York, including 64 colleges and universities
• Named the “Official Print Design and Hardware, Service and Supplies Provider”
• Expected to realize savings up to $20 million annually
• Will supposedly eliminate 1.125 metric tons of carbon emissions
• Includes optimizing current 40,000 print devices installed
• Current volume of 250 million pages per year
• Install to be completed by July, 2024

Toshiba sale update

• Reuters News Service is reporting that Japan Industrial Partners has come closer to securing financing from banks
• Is still the preferred bidder to acquire all of Toshiba
• Possible purchase price of $16 billion

Signs of recession?

• Research published by economist, Nick Eberstadt of the American Enterprise Institute
  • Around 7 million “prime age” men between ages of 25 and 54 are not looking for work
    • “They are affirmatively not looking for work.”
    • 25% of prime age Americans are not currently working
      • “vast majority of these prime-age men spend around 2,000 hours a year on screens, do little housework and don’t spend time volunteering”
      • College-educated women are now participating in workforce at same rate as they were before pandemic
        • College-age men working or looking for work has lessened
    • US Chamber of Commerce survey of Americans who lost their job during COVID-19 pandemic:

• • • • 25% say federal aid incentivized them to not actively look for work
      • 50% are not willing to take jobs that do not offer option of remote work
      • 33% of younger respondents are focusing on new skills and/or prioritizing personal growth before entering labor force
  • More pressure being put on employees that remain in workforce, causing them to deal with longer hours, tougher responsibilities and burnout
    • “Running your workers like this – asking them to do 20%, 30% more because you are short-staffed – it is very much a short-term strategy”; stated Paige Ouimet, professor at University of North Carolina Kenon-Flagler Business School
• Wall Street Journal reports on financial institutions
  • Return on common equity through 9/30/2022 for top 3 firms
    • Goldman Sachs, only 12.2% compared with 25.7% in 2021
    • JPMorgan, only 14% compared with 20% in 2021
    • Morgan Stanley, up to 15.1% compared to 11.9% in 2021
  • Goldman Sachs CEO David Solomon is reported shrinking the bonus pool for senior employees by as much as half
• Jason Furman, economics professor at Harvard University, in interview on CNBC:
  • Most likely economic scenario is a mild recession that does not solve inflation
  • “we need to have to another go at the whole thing”
• Larry Summers, former Director of the National Economic Council, interviewed by Bloomberg:

o “November jobs report shows that we have got a long way to go to get inflation down”

• • “inflation is going to be a little more sustained that what people are looking for”
  • “I think what this is telling us is that the Fed’s got a long way to go”
  • “we are probably going to need increases in interest rates…”
• BlackRock published report entitled “2023 Global Outlook”
  • “Recession is foretold as central banks race to try to tame inflation”
  • “It is the opposite of past recessions”
  • “Worldwide recessions is just around the corner as central banks boost borrowing costs aggressively to tame inflation, and this time, it will ignite more market turbulence than ever before”
  • “Equity valuations do not yet reflect the damage ahead”
• Sam Zell, founder and chairman of Equity Group Investments interviewed on Fox Business:
  • “”I think the odds of us going into recession are very high, and whether that recession will be very painful or not, I think remains to be seen”
  • “it’s very hard for me to believe that we are not moving into an area with a lot of higher interest rates and a lot of people sitting on the sidelines avoiding making commitments”
• U.S. Labor Department announced that U.S. wholesale pricing rose 0.3% in November, the third month in a row with 0.3% gain
  • Core producer index, which excludes volatile food, energy and trade prices, also rose 0.3%
  • Food prices up 3.3%
  • Trade services up 0.7%

Large dealer announces new executives

• Prosource, headquartered in Cincinnati, Ohio, announced it has hired Jay Cartisano as President of Imaging and Managed Print Services
  • Previously was President of Connecticut Business System, a Xerox company
• Jeff Loeb was promoted to President of Prosource Technologies (managed services division)
• Report to Ben Russert, CEO

Digital Transformation survey

• Survey conducted by Opinium Research
• Digital transformation could increase gross domestic product by 3.4% over next 5 years
• 76% of business leaders are making automation of tedious tasks part of their DX strategy
• Average worker spends up to 30% of their day on administrative tasks
• 64% of employees say they would bring more value to their company if they had access to right technology
• 78% welcome automation tools
• Those who implemented some automation software experienced average productivity increase of 14%

Ninestar of China to open facilities in US

• (Ninestar of China is owner of Lexmark)
• Announced it has raised $1.41 billion yuan ($202 million) from private issuance of stock
• Will be used for:
  • Renewable printer consumables production base
  • Research and development center

Foxconn to invest more in India

• (Foxconn, aka Hon Hai Precision of Taiwan, is parent of Sharp)
• Announced it will spend $500 million in country of India
• Will expand its chipmaking factories there to reduce its reliance on plants in China

HP wins production print contract

• Award from West Canadian Digital Imaging Inc. of Calgary
• Installed a new Indigo 15K production color system
• Also included HP Site Flow solution and Latex R2000 wide format inkjet printer
• Will be used to produce a wide variety of on-demand personalized products

Ricoh wins production print contract

• Award from in-plant printshop at Tacoma Public Schools of Washington
• Replaces Xerox Versant 80
• Installed new Pro C7210 production color laser system
• Claims it was having difficulty getting toner from Xerox

Report on use of print in small businesses

• Lexmark, a division of Ninestar of China, published results of survey
• 80% of small business owners say printers/MFPs are necessary to conduct daily operations
• 50% say cannot operate at all without print
• 49% need device to do more than just print
• 53% own at least one device that breaks down at least once per month
• 69% find it difficult to source reliable office printers
• Law and automobile sector small businesses average 240 pages per day
  • Healthcare small business averages 178 pages per day
  • Accounting/finance small business average of up to 35 pages per day

CYBERSECURITY & HEALTHCARE VERTICAL NEWS

Feds warn healthcare of new hacking group

• Published report warning the U.S. healthcare industry of ransomware attacks from a new group in the country of Cuba
• Using the RomCom malware to encrypt networks and demand ransom to provide decrypt key

Even if pay ransom, won’t get files back from hacker?

• Fortinet Cybersecurity published warning about new Cryptonite ransomware
• Created using Python programming language
• Attacked systems running Microsoft Windows
• Researchers found that even if you pay the hacker the demanded ransom, the ransomware is not capable of decrypting the files
• Instead the files are destroyed

Hospital MPS provider to offer new solution

• Vereco, headquartered in Mission Viejo, CA, offers managed print services to hospitals across the U.S. (formerly known as Auxilio)
  • Claims to provide MPS to 300+ hospital locations in 48 states
• Announced it is now a reseller for Symphion of Dallas, TX
  • Maker of print fleet cyber security solutions

New botnet targets IoT devices

• (IoT or Internet of Things devices, could include printers and MFPs0
• Security Week magazine detailed the new Zerobot malware written in Golang programming language
• Exploits devices with Spring4Shell and F5 Big-IP flaws
• Scans for open ports and begins spreading itself

Healthcare solutions market growth

• Research report published by ReleaseWire
• Healthcare interoperability solutions market will grow to $5.7 billion by 2026
• CAGR (cumulative annual growth rate) of 13.9%

Large EHR’s founder retires

• Meditech announced that founder and board chair A. Neil Pappalardo has retired from the company that he started 54 years ago.
• Was inventor of the MUMPS system, which is host-based OS

Cerner wins EHR contract

• Award from Marshfield Clinic of Wisconsin
• Replacing homegrown Cattails EHR

Epic solution site to be taken down temporarily

• Epic’s “App Market”, formerly known as the “App Orchard” will be taken down and undergo renovations and relaunch later in 2023
• Site was used to show solution providers certified by Epic
• Will launch “Connection Hub”, a place for vendors to share their ability to interoperate with Epic software.