The copier industry is constantly evolving, and staying up-to-date with the latest news and information can be crucial for businesses and professionals who rely on these machines for their daily operations. Here are the latest headlines from the Copier Industry:
HP has more security problems
- Cyber Security News magazine is reporting that almost 50 different models of HP LaserJet Enterprise and HP LaserJet Managed MFP and printers have flaws that could allow hackers to gain unauthorized access
- Hackers could gain access to customer sensitive information
- Bleeping Computer magazine reports that HP hopes to issue firmware fix in 90 days
Lexmark offers new color laser A4 MFP
- Lexmark is a division of Ninestar of China
- Now offering the CX737adzse color laser A4 MFP
- 4 tandem OPC drum design
- Top speed of 52ppm
- 6.7 second first page out time
- Advertised as offering up to 4800dpi, but actual is 1200x1200dpi
- New VariTherm fuser technology for wider selection of media handling
- Auto duplex up to 75gsm bond
- Supports vinyl labels,
- Pantone calibration
- 150/mo max duty cycle, but recommended max is 20K/mo
- Document feeder scans both sides of original at same time
- Top scan speed of 52opm or 104ipm
- Holds up to 100 originals
- Black & color toner cartridge choices have yields of 5K, 16.2K & 28K pages based on 5% coverage per page
- 10” color LCD touchscreen control panel
- Fax board standard
- Comes standard with 550 sheet paper drawer and 100 sheet stack bypass
- Can add up to 4 more 550 sheet paper drawers
- Optional convenience stapler
- Built-in print controller:
- 1.2GHz quadcore processor
- TPM security chip
- 2GB RAM
- Solid state memory chips (memory size not published???)
- 500GB hard drive option
- Security features?
- 10/100/1000BaseT & USB ports
- Optional WiFi
Xerox offers new b/w laser A4 MFP
- Now offering the VersaLink B625/DN
- $3405 MSRP
- White plastic exterior with dark grey accents
- Top speed of 65ppm
- 4.4 second first page out time
- 300K/mo max duty cycle, recommended max is 30K/mo
- 1200x1200dpi
- Comes standard with 550 sheet paper drawer and 100 sheet stack bypass
- Can expand to 3,850 sheets with options
- Document feeder scans both sides of original at same time
- Top scan speed of 75opm or 150ipm
- Holds up to 200 originals
- Built-in print controller:
- 10/100/1000BaseT & USB ports
- Optional WiFi
- 4GB RAM
- Optional 500GB hard drive
- 1.2GHz quadcore processor
- No security features mentioned?
Xerox has production print related security issues
- BSI magazine is reporting that Xerox’s FreeFlow Print Server for its production print devices has multiple security vulnerabilities
- Allows a hacker to potentially execute arbitrary code, perform cross-site scripting attacks, disclose information, cause denial of service and/or manipulate file
Toshiba to launch new A3 laser MFPs
- eSTUDIO 6527A, 6527ACT, 7527A & 7527ACT are new color laser A3 MFPs
- eSTUDIO 6529A, 7529A and 9029A are new b/w laser A3 MFPs
- top print speeds are the first two digits of the model number, ranging from 65ppm to 90ppm
- dark grey plastic exteriors
- will use SSD instead of HDDs, up to 128GB
- document feeders will scan both sides of originals at same time, and have double-feed detection sensors
- scan to OCR will be standard
- 6GB of RAM
- Touchless biometric authentication
- Banner printing support
College and University inplant printshop survey
- Research published by IPI
- 47% have open positions that they can not fill
- 59% of managers end up working on shop floor
- 41% have increase in overtime work
- 65% are expanding what they offer
- 41% are experiencing increase in revenue YoY
- 90% now offer some type of wide format printing
- 43% have increase in demand for wide format
- 19% now have flatbed color inkjet printer
- 10% plan on buying flatbed printer in 2023
- 22% plan on buying contour cutter
- 13% plan on buying latex wide format printer
- Top applications are; posters, banners, wall graphics, labels, floor graphics, window graphics
- 80% now only have digital presses
- 73% have b/w digital presses
- 58% have color digital presses
- 48% use MFPs for production purposes
- Only 3% have color inkjet presses
- 95% of jobs are in color
- 73% have web-to-print solution
- 99% print booklets
- 97% print business cards
- 96% print stationery
- 89% print direct mail
- 87% print envelopes
- 87% print newsletters
- 84% print course packs
Sharp has new MFP security problems
- Japan Vulnerability News is reporting that many of Sharp’s MFP have a “command injection vulnerability”
- Could allow a hacker to insert an arbitrary command to be executed
- Sharp claims to have issued firmware update to resolve problem
Signs of recession?
- McDonald’s account it temporarily shut down all of its US offices and cancelled in-person meetings when it prepared to execute layoffs
- Revenue and profit have been impacted by “record high inflation rates”
- Position cuts include corporate level
- Company is headquartered in Chicago, IL
- “difficult discussions and decisions ahead”
- “we want to ensure the comfort and confidentially of our people during the notification period”
- Before layoffs, had roughly 200,000 employees worldwide in corporate roles and company owned restaurants
- Challenger, Gray & Christmas reported on jobs market in March, 2023
- Job cuts surged 15% in March
- Number of layoffs climbing 15% from just one month ago
- Companies announced 89,703 job cuts in March
- 319% higher than the same time one year ago.
- So far this year, employers announced plans to cut more than 270,416 jobs
- 396% increase from the nearly 55,696 cuts announced in the equivalent time period last year
- highest quarterly total since the spring of 2020, when the economy was still in the throes of the COVID-19 pandemic.
- tech industry has already slashed about 102,391 jobs so far in 2023, a stunning increase of 38,487% from just one year ago.
- “With rate hikes continuing and companies’ reigning in costs, the large-scale layoffs we are seeing will likely continue.”
- Of the 236,000 jobs added in March, 75,000 of them were second jobs
- The Federal Reserve announced that a staggering $360 billion was withdrawn from banks in the U.S. during past month
- Total bank deposits are down almost $1 trillion since April of 2022
- $7 trillion of the total of $17 trillion bank deposits remain uninsured
- “What is unclear for us is how much of these banking stresses are leading to a widespread credit crunch”, stated Neel Kashkari, president of Fed Reserve Bank of Minneapolis
- “That credit crunch would then slow down the economy”
- “This could become a big issue for local communities, regions, and sectors that fear that their access to loans will be curtailed because their traditional banking partners will have to shrink their balance sheets after losing deposits”; stated Mohamed El-Erian, Allianz/PIMCO
- “threatens to increase the challenges facing an economy that is dealing with inflation, a mishandled interest rate hiking cycle, declines in personal savings, bouts of financial instability and a slowing global economy”
- “By sometime late this year or early next year, we expect consumers will have spent the bulk of their remaining excess savings”; stated JP Morgan CEO, Jamie Dimon
- “It remains to be seen whether this will cause a little bit of a cliff effect or whether consumer spending will simply slow down”
- “Either way, this will add to whatever recessionary pressures there are sometime in the future”
- “Essentially, we may be moving, as I read somewhere, from a virtuous cycle to a vicious cycle”
- Google announced cost cutting plans
- Will layoff 12,000 employees in 2023
- Will cut back on tape, staplers and laptop PC replacements for workers
- Also will no longer provide fitness classes for its employees, and cut back on funding for cafes, and mobile phone usage
- Eliminated 27 onsite massage therapists
- PayPal Holdings Inc. announced it will rid itself of 2,000 full time workers
- Blames it on “challenging macro-economic environment”
- Morgan Stanley warned the commercial real estate prices “could crash 40% from their peak”
- Caused by hybrid working and higher interest rates
- The country of Saudi Arabia announced it will be cutting oil-production, which will cause an increase in gas prices in the U.S., and already increased by as much as 8% in past week.
- Tiffany Wilding, economist with PIMCO, stated that banking crisis gives risk of “sooner and deeper recession”
- UBS published a report stating that small businesses in the U.S. are experiencing a surge in bankruptcies
- 4 week moving average was 73% higher than June of 2020
- Companies with fewer than 500 employees make up 58% of the privately employed US workforce
- “There has been mounting evidence that the notion the U.S. economy is on strong enough footing to withstand materially higher interest rates may have been misplaced”; stated Mark Haefele, CIO of UBS.
- Institute for Supply Management published report:
- U.S. manufacturing fell to a 3 year low in March, 2023
- 4th month of contraction
- Wall Street Journal article details analysis of Federal Reserve data:
- Millennials (born between 1981 and 1996) are sinking under the weight of their debts, adding a record $3.8 trillion to the pile at the end of 2022
- This marks a 27% rise from late 2019 — the biggest jump of any age group — and it’s the fastest they’ve ever accumulated debt since the 2008 financial crisis.
- Household debt hit $16.90 trillion in the last quarter of 2022, as consumers grappled with rising inflation and interest rates.
- 60% of working Americans aren’t confident about retiring one day.
Kyocera to dump Copystar brand
- Kyocera, aka Kyoto Ceramic Company, announced that it will replace the Copystar brand with the Kyocera brand
- Change takes place starting 6/30/2023
- “Copystar dealers can now leverage the Kyocera brand to their advantage”
Kyocera affected by ransomware attack
- Fujitsu, the largest provider of managed IT services to companies in Japan, suffered a hacking attack that has impacted many of its customers
- Kyocera is one of 10 Japanese companies that has reported that they were affected by the attack on Fujitsu
- Hackers apparently gained access to communications sent through Fujitsu-based email system
Kyocera buys land for new plant
- Announced it has acquired 37 acres of land in the Minami Isahaya Industrial Park in Isahaya City, Nagasaki, Japan for $466 million
- Will build plants to manufacture ceramic components for semiconductor industry
Hyland OnBase to layoff 1,000 employees
- 20% of its workforce will be terminated
- blames layoffs on economic conditions and unexpectedly high cost of moving to a cloud-based system for its OnBase ECM (enterprise content management) solution
- Moody’s recently reduced Hyland’s credit rating from “stable” to “negative”
- Private equity group, Thoma Bravo, acquired a majority stake in Hyland in 2007 for $265 million
- Led the company to make a series of expensive acquisitions, including Valco Data Systems, EWebHealth, OneContent and the Perceptive Software division of Lexmark
- The debt accumulated through these acquisitions has created financial duress in wake of surging interest rates
Accounts payable automation opportunity
- Research published by CPA Practice Advisor magazine
- Only 10% of accounts payable (AP) operations are fully automated, as most are paper-based
- AP automation market size was $2.9 billion in 2021
- Will grow to $7.13 billion by 2030
Ricoh makes acquisition
- Announced it has acquired PFH Technology Group, headquartered in Cork, Ireland
- Is a managed IT services firm that also has offices in Dublin and Galway
- 750 employees
- More than 1,000 customers
Ricoh to change brand on scanners
- Ricoh spent $625 million in April of 2022 to acquire the document scanner division from Fujitsu
- Has now announced it will remove the Fujitsu brand from the scanners, and replace with Ricoh brand
Supply chain concern?
- ABC 7 News in Los Angeles, CA, is reporting that Los Angeles and Long Beach ports closed for the second day in a row on Friday due to a labor shortage.
- 40% of the nation’s foreign goods arrive to the United States to these two ports in Southern California.
- ILWU union workers at both ports are currently in talks for a new contract.
- The ILWU Local 13 withheld workers from their shifts starting Thursday evening, according to the Pacific Maritime Association, which represents shipping employers on the West Coast.
- “The action by the Union has effectively shut down the Ports of Los Angeles and Long Beach – the largest gateway for maritime trade in the United States,” the PMA said.
Large dealer to sell EV charging stations
- All Copy Products, headquartered in Denver, CO, announced it has become an authorized reseller of electric vehicle (EV) charging products offered by Terra Energy Services (TES)
- TES is a division of ACDI (Access Control Devices Inc.), most well known as a distributor for Papercut print management solutions
Screen wins production print contract
- Award from KP LLC of Renton, Washington
- Installed a new Truepress Jet520HD production color inkjet system
- Will be used to produce transactional and direct mail pieces
Canon to resell production cutting equipment
- Announced it is now reseller form Kongsberg Precision Cutting Systems
- Will resell the C24 and C64 systems, with offer cutting and routing/milling for finishing output of Canon’s wide format color inkjet printers
- Aimed at needs for packaging, sign/display, environmental graphics and corrugated products
Fujifilm gives more details on new PPS
- Fujifilm is actual manufacturer for almost all Xerox branded devices
- (unknown if Xerox will relabel future models)
- Launched the new Revoria Press EC1100, SC170 and SC180 production color laser systems
- Top speeds of 100ppm, 70ppm and 80ppm respectively
- White plastic exterior with dark grey accents
- 1200x1200dpi
- Advertised as offering 10 bit gradation
- EC1000 includes inline spectrophotometer for automatic color calibration and front/back registration
- All models offer optional air suction paper feeding
- Support banner sheets up to 47” long
- Handles 52gsm to 400gsm media
- Color Profile Maker for Display feature helps match colors by adjusting colors on the monitor to match printed output
- Color Match Reprint Job feature allows end user to scan an existing printed document, and then output jobs with matched colors
- SC170 and SC180 includes SIQA technology, which prints out a test chart, which is then scanned by device, allowing for image quality correction and front/back registration adjustments
- AI Photo Quality Optimization feature sues artificial intelligence to automatically review the scene for each photograph on the page and correct it
- Resolves issues such as image being too dark/light, backlight exposure, skin tones and bringing out hues in blue skies
- Optional finishing features include; cover inserter, hole-punch, stapling, saddle stitch, bi-fold, z-fold, tri-fold, incision, 3 side trimming, and square back booklets
Production print for packaging market growth
- Report from Insight Partners
- Digital packaging print market will surpass $32 billion by 2028
- Growth rate of more than 9% CAGR in the U.S.
- Includes digital labels, flexible packaging, corrugated wrappings, and folding cartons
CIOs will now hire people without degrees?
- Study published by Burning Glass Institute found that 46%of middle-skill and 31% of high-skill occupations underwent degree “resets” between 2017 and 2019
- Opened an estimated 1.4 million jobs to people without college degrees over the next 5 years
- “There are some who still prefer a college degree, seeing it — rightly or wrongly — as shorthand for showing that candidates have conscientiousness and the capacity to learn,” Bob Dutile, a former CIO who is now chief commercial officer at digital transformation company UST
- “But we and others have not found that it’s necessary.”
- CIOs said help desk roles, programmers, developers, designers, engineers, architects, analysts, and some management positions are more reliant on technical skills
- “Degrees do matter when looking for certain leadership roles in IT,” Antonio Taylor, vice president of infrastructure, security and services at genotyping company Transnetyx, told CIO.
CYBERSECURITY & HEALTHCARE VERTICAL NEWS
Report on why healthcare use of GPOs will grow
- Most healthcare facilities in the U.S. use at least one of the 4 national healthcare group purchasing organizations (GPOs)
- Research published by HGPII shows value provided by the GPOs:
- Assisting in providing fair, transparent, predictable supply chain
- Providing sophisticated data analytics to mitigate some of the supply chain risks
- Contribute expertise to support practical improvements
- Improving management of inventories and predict shortfalls
- Introducing new products, technologies and services
- Fostering improvements in health practices and outcomes
- Dispute resolution processes available to reduce contract award conflicts
- (Konica Minolta is a contracted brand on all 4 of the national GPOs, including Healthtrust, Premier, Vizient & HPSI, and all may be used by authorized Konica Minolta dealers via DPA)
Hospital gets solution to handle fax volume
- The Center for Digital Health Innovation at San Francisco-based UCSF Health (aka University of California – San Francisco Hospital ) has been honored for employing artificial intelligence to sort through millions of faxes.
- Received the Global Excellence Awards from AI Journal for best use of AI in the public sector and best use of intelligence automation for a tool developed with AI cloud company H2O.ai.
- The Refs & Docs platform automates the processing of the roughly 1.4 million faxes received annually, saving thousands of hours of staff time.
etherFAX now offers Direct Secure Messaging
- etherFAX, headquartered in Holmdel, New Jersey, is provider of hybrid cloud fax solutions sold by many dealers in the U.S.
- To grow its marketshare in the growing healthcare vertical, has announced new partnership with MaxMD, headquartered in Fort Lee, New Jersey
- Will allow etherFAX cloud fax users to have ability to scan and send paper-based PHI documents as Direct Secure Messages
- Will help healthcare facilities meet new requirement to communicate PHI in a digital, interoperable format, and wean themselves off of fax
- (do your healthcare customers know that the Konica Minolta Healthcare MFPs, powered by Kno2, can scan and send PHI as Direct Secure Messages?)
Healthcare IT budgets to grow
- Healthcare IT market will grow to $609.1 billion by 2030 according to research published by Contrive Data Insights Inc.
- Will grow at a CAGR (cumulative annual growth rate) of 17.9%
- Was valued at $142.7 Billion In 2022
- Evolve Business Intelligence published report predicting the Digital Transformation (DX) in Healthcare market will grow at 30% from 2023 to 2033
- Will reach $1 trillion in spend worldwide
Epic overworks its employees?
- Article published in The Daily Cardinal about Epic Systems, maker of the EHRs, headquartered in Verona, Wisconsin
- Former employees interviewed claimed issues with work-life balance and strict hybrid-work policy
- 55% of the employees are between 20 and 30 years old
- Highly social and closed-off work environment
- “lot of emphasis on people socializing together and going out together and joining clubs together”
- “creates a very insulated social bubble for you to live within”
- “definitely had mental health struggles as a result of being overworked”
- “not having time to see friends or family”
- “the work really never ends”
- “more in the 60 to 80 hours a week range”
Epic building more office buildings
- Article in The Verona Press newspaper of Wisconsin
- The “Castaway” building just opened
- Now building the “Restaurant 42” building
- Next is building the “Sci-Fi” building, the “Guilds” building and the “Creatures” building
- Will hire 1,700 new employees to add to current 11,000 on site in Verona, WI
Athenahealth wins EHR contract
- Award from Advanced Orthopedics New England of Springfield, Massachusetts
- Installed new AthenaOne platform, including mobile app for patients
Interlace Software wins eforms solution contract
- Award from King’s Daughter Medical Center of Ashland, Kentucky
- Claims that 2,500 paper forms were in use previously
- Reduced 60% to 1,000 forms, which are now digital
HIPAA/cybersecurity breaches in the news
- Only 57% of healthcare chief security officers admit to monitoring the Dark Web to improve their cybersecurity, according to research from Searchlight Cyber.
- Microsoft received a court order from the U.S. District Court for the Eastern District of New York to disrupt infrastructure used by Russian ransomware gangs during hospital attacks.
- allows Microsoft to cut off communication between hackers and a fake version of the cybersecurity software Cobalt Strike, used by hackers to breach hospital systems.
- The federal government is warning about Russian hacktivist group KillNet which is attacking healthcare organizations in the United States in retaliation for U.S. Congress’s support for Ukraine war
- The Pentagon admitted that top secret documents that provide details of US and NATO plans to help prepare Ukraine army for attack against Russia have spilled onto social media platforms
- The New York Times reports that the stolen documents contain charts and details about weapons deliveries, battalion strengths and other sensitive information about Ukraine War
- US MedClinic of Carrollton, Georgia notified an unknown number of patients that their PHI was illegally accessed by a former physician.
- Majestic Care, with extended care locations across Indiana, Ohio and Michigan, notified 2,636 patients that their PHI was exposed after cyber incident
- Lawrence General Hospital of Lawrence, Massachusetts, notified 76,571 patients that their PHI was exposed after hacking incident.
- Tallahassee Memorial Healthcare of Florida notified an unknown number of patients had their PHI exposed after a hacking incident.
- Montgomery General Hospital of West Virginia notified an unknown number of patients that their PHI was exposed after a ransomware attack, where hackers are demanding $750,000 in ransom.
- Northwest Health, headquartered in Laporte, Indiana, notified an unknown number of patients that their PHI was after paper medical records were left behind in a vacant building.
- TMX Finance, aka TitleMax, headquartered in Savannah, Georgia, notified an unknown number of customers that their info was exposed after hacking incident.
- Blue Shield Insurance of California notified 63,341 patients that their PHI was exposed after ransomware attack.
- Health Plan of San Mateo in California notified 4,032 patients that their PHI was exposed after email phishing attack.
- California Department of Health Care Services notified 6,460 patients that their PHI was exposed after mailing error.
- Illinois Gastroenterology Group notified 227,943 patients that their PHI was exposed and agreed to pay up to $5,000 per patient to cover cost damages and losses.
- Western Digital notified an unknown number of customers that their info was exposed after security breach.
- Toyota is warning of a device that can be used to hack into and steal some of its vehicles.
- Monument/Tempest, an online alcohol recovery system, notified 100,000 patients that their PHI may have been exposed after mistaken data sharing.
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