Toshiba financial issues update

– Reuters News Service is reporting that Western Digital Corp. has offered $17.8 billion to buy the NAND memory chip division of Toshiba Corp.

o Toshiba is hoping to only sell an interest in the division, as it needs to raise cash to keep solvent.

– The nuclear plant division, known as Westinghouse, is fielding interest from those looking to buy the bankrupt division, and expects to begin a sale process in late summer of 2017

o The sale process will begin after division gains approval of a business plan that it expects to file in bankruptcy court in early July

o Reuters News Service reports that the company stopped making pension payments to former division executives

Xerox details its transformation

– Held a shareholders meeting where following was presented:

– Will consolidate MPS (managed print services) delivery and technical service under one organizational structure to reduce costs by $450 million

o Workflow automation to increase remote solve rates

o Optimize field resources for more productive onsite dispatches

– Will capture supplier productivity and reduce manufacturing footprint to save $250 million

– Will reduce complexity with 30% reduction in management layers to save $300 million

o Shift organizational axis to geography

o Reduce matrix management

o Consolidate back office support functions

o Rationalize real estate portfolio

– Will integrate supply chain under one global function to save $200 million

o Outsource consumable distribution to 3rd party

o Combine equipment and parts warehouses

o Rebid major spend categories

– Will introduce new sales and contracting pricing optimization tools to save $300 million

– Claims that the worldwide market for A3 MFPs is $23 billion today, and will shrink 5% CAGR by 2019

o Claims to have 22% marketshare currently

– Claims that the worldwide market for A4 MFPs is $12 billion today, and will grow 3% CAGR by 2019

o Claims to have 6% marketshare

– In SMB, believes that basic print services market is $10 billion growing by 7%

o managed print services contract revenue opportunity is $7 billion, growing by 7%

o 75% of SMB is served by dealers

o states that large enterprises will spend $6 billion on MPS with 2% CAGR

– Believes that the production color market opportunity worldwide is $5 billion with 5% CAGR

o Believes it has 29% marketshare

o States that only 3% of the 50 trillion pages printed worldwide are digital

– Claims that workflow solution market is $3 billion opportunity (document capture, etc.)

– Currently has 1800 direct sales reps worldwide

– Last year Xerox equipment produced 96 billion pages

Xerox wins production print contract

– Award from Amherst College of Amherst, Massachusetts

– Installed a Versant 80 production color laser system in the Campus Print & Mail Center

– Reasons given by Rod Squier, shop manager:

o Ability to match Pantone 267, which is school’s color

o Envelope printing

o Optional square fold trimmer module for booklets with staple in spine

HP presents its last quarter’s earnings

– Net revenue up 7% to $12.4 billion for all divisions, including PCs, laptops, printers, MFPs, etc.

– Printer/MFP division

revenue up 2%

to $4.743 billion or 38% of total

o Printer/MFP supplies revenue up 2%

§ 25% of total company and 67% of division

o Printer/MFP division brings in 77% of total operating profit or $825 million

o Operating profit margin of 17.4%

o Total hardware placements up 4%

o

Commercial hardware units up 6%

o Consumer hardware units up 3%

– U.S. brings in 36% of total revenue

HP to sell MFP supplies in distribution

– Announced that for its new LaserJet MFPs, will be providing two different toner cartridges:

o Available online from distributors, will be lower yield cartridge, for example a 60ppm product will have a 28,000 page yield black cartridge for sale online, but authorized dealers will be able to get cartridge with a 32,200 page yield

– The A4 models will have different model number scheme:

o The dealer version Color LaserJet E67560Z is based on open distribution model Color LaserJet M682z, making it hard for end user to comparison shop

o Will have different MSRPs, i.e. model# E67560Z = $8835.75 and M682z = $7873.83

o Will have different max duty cycles for dealer versions will appear to handle large volumes, even though engine is same

HP awarded toner cartridge design patent

– #9,618,898 will allow HP to increase the size of the toner supply without increasing the size of a small printer or MFP

– The toner cartridge could be configured as a non-removable component to simply devices construction, and the toner supply large enough to last life of contract

IBM pulls plug on “work from home”

– CEO, Ginni Rometty, directed thousands of employees to work from set locations or else look for another job

– Claims that new policy is “meant to improve collaboration and accelerate innovation”

– As much as 40% of the company’s workforce was working remotely

 

HP’s CEO on Xerox buying dealers

– CEO, Dion Weisler, was interviewed in latest issue of CRN magazine, about how Xerox’s Global division continues to buy competing copier dealers, and converting them to Xerox

– “I don’t think you can buy customers.  I don’t think buying share is the right way to run a business.  The right way to run a business is to have an incredible value proposition that is sustainable, where it makes sense economically and technically solves a problem for the customer.”

o “You might get a short term boost in performance.  It doesn’t necessarily stick because a customer only ever sticks around if you are adding value”

o “Our approach is to build incredible innovative technology rather than buying channel partners – effectively competing with them.”

o “If I were a channel partner, I would be thinking twice about whether  I want to be working with a company that is out there buying my competitors and competing against me every single day”

Ricoh adds “Smart Support” to new MFP

– Positions as new component of its “Workstyle Innovation Technology” platform

– “RemoteConnect Support” enables Ricoh dealer call center operator to access MFP remotely to diagnose and/or resolve problem  

– “Remote Panel Operation” enables customer’s IT admin to remotely view and operate walkup control panel from web within firewall

– “Automatic Remote Management Service” (ARMS) allows Ricoh dealer technician to remotely view MFP diagnostics

– “Automatic Remote Firmware Update” (ARFU) allows dealer service department to update firmware of customer’s fleet remotely

– “Web Help” allows end users to access self help resources

– “SendMeter App” allows customer to send meter reading, and their frequency to up to 8 email addresses  

– “Low Toner & Service Code Notification” allows MFP to send an email when toner levels reach a specified value, as well as service codes

(most of above competes with Konica Minolta’s vCare)

Nuance ships new version of eCopy

– Launched version 6.0 of eCopy ShareScan document capture/OCR solution

– RapPID preference feature that personalizes workflows based on user’s recent activity

– Windows Active Directory for secure session logon

– System Administrator tools allow for decreased IT presence through admin console

Cartridge supplier has fire

– LMI announced that its facility in Guanajuato, Mexico reported a fire

– Supposedly only caused a temporary disruption in cartridge production

– Now workers were injured

Canon wins production print contract

– Award Camelot Print & Copy Center of Latham, NY

– Installed an Oce’ VarioPrint i300 production color cutsheet inkjet system

 

InfoTrends reports on Inkjet production

– Expects global digital production color volume to reach 895 pages by 2020

– Inkjet production print to reach 60% of total digital pages

– Projects that digital print volumes in the U.S. to increase 4% by 2020

o Corrugated up 108.9%

o Flexible packaging up 42.4%

o Magazines up 27.8%

o Folding cartons up 24%

o Ad specialty up 20.9%

o Catalogs up 16.7%

o Newspapers/newsletters up 14.8%

o Posters/banners/signage up 10.6%

o Books up 10.2%

o Labels up 8.6%

Okidata to offer new solution for its MFPs

– Okidata announced it signed agreement with Ringdale Software

– Will now offer Ringdale’s FollowMe print management/cost recovery solution

o (competes with Nuance Output Manager, Equitrac, PaperCut, YSoft, etc.)

– Can be integrated into the LCD panel of Extendable Platform (sXP) equipped Okidata MFPs

HPE continues to frustrate its sales reps

– According to article in Business Insider magazine, Hewlett Packard Enterprise is still having difficulty calculating and paying commission to its sales force.

– On 4/27/17 HPE held an all-hands meeting for thousands of reps in North America and apologized to them for the problems it was having with its MyComp program

– Apparently, this has caused serious inconvenience and stress for employees, many of whom have had to borrow money from HPE

– “We know this has been a source of frustration for many of you, and we apologize for that.”; stated Cheryl Brown, VP & COO.

o “As a result of the challenges we have given impacted salespeople a choice between remaining on our draw program, or moving to incentive compensation until all of these issues have been addressed”

– The problem supposedly began when Hewlett Packard split into two companies; Hewlett Packard Enterprise, and HP Inc.

– Has had problems accurately informing salespeople about their compensation for a second year in a row

Sony launches Digital Paper DPT-RP1

– Resembles a tablet PC

– Display uses flexible TFT technology

– Can read display even in direct sunlight

– 13.3” display with 1650×2200 resolution

– 0.23” thick, and weighs 12.3 ounces

– 16GB RAM, holds up to 10,000 PDF documents

– Operates up to 3 weeks on a single battery charge

– Included writing instrument allows for handwritten notes, annotations and highlighting

– Marvell 64 bit Quad core processor

– Base MSRP of $699.99

 

Sharp details its business plan?

– Tai Jeng-wu, who was installed as the CEO of Sharp by its new owner Hon Hai Precision Industry Co. Ltd. of Taiwan (aka Foxconn), held a news conference for reporters and its shareholders

– Forecast that Sharp would report a net profit  of $530 million following cost cutting measures

– Will invest up to $1 billion in SoftBank Group Corp.’s technology focused Vision Fund, which is bidding on the NAND flash memory division of Toshiba

– May also build an LCD manufacturing plan in the U.S. if certain conditions are met

(in presentation given to shareholders on plans for future Sharp-branded products, there was no specific mention of any MFPs or printers)

 

Nuance reports its earning

– For last quarter, Imaging division (eCopy, AutoStore, Equitrac, Output Manager, etc.) revenue went down 7% to $53 million

– “The decline was driven by lower MFP revenue as we continue to work through our reorganization of the Imaging sales team.”; stated Paul Ricci, CEO

– “I think this is a year in which we should expect to see the remediation with the goal of stabilization and setting up for growth next year based on additional sales investments we are making over the second half of this year and product investments we are also making”

HP wins production print contract

– Award from University of North Texas in Denton, TX

– Installed an HP Indigo 10000 production color system

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