WeP Peripherals does a Xerox in laser printing

WeP has an innovative ‘pay as you use’ laser printing outsourcing service for corporate users that mimics the business model of photocopy giants such as Xerox. Having successfully nourished its Print and Save model, the company is gearing up to launch remote printing, says Akhtar Pasha

Offsite Web-based printing offers the convenience of remote printing, documanagement, and mobile printing, says Raghavendra Prakash S

Leading sewing thread manufacturer, Coats India saves a considerable amount per annum on printer maintenance and recurring costs on purchasing inkjet cartridges by outsourcing its printing requirements to WeP Peripherals. The company used to spend Rs 2,000 on annual maintenance per printer and Rs 15-20 lakh on cartridges every year. Coats India achieved these considerable savings by replacing its inkjet printers with 14 laser printers across the country that it leased from WeP Peripherals. Murli Narayan, IT manager at Coats India says, "The costs of managing and deploying inkjet printers, including toner costs are quite high. In addition to this, inkjet printers cannot be deployed centrally and cannot be shared over the network. The WeP Print and Save service allows us to share printers across the network and we do not need to invest in costly laser printers." St Marks Hotel, another WeP customer, has a similar tale. The company is saving 25 percent per annum on printer maintenance and cartridges.

WeP started its innovative ‘Print and Save’ pay-as-you-use laser printing service for corporates as a test marketing exercise in August 2002. Its business model mimics the hugely successful one of photocopy giants such as Xerox who lease copiers and charge companies on the basis of copies made. Today Print and Save is a full-blown service offering catering to over 300 customers with an installed base of 650 laser printers. The success of this service can be measured from the fact that WeP has extended its services from the initial three cities of Bangalore, Mumbai and Chennai to five additional locations—Delhi, Ahmedabad, Hyderabad, Pune and Kolkata. All this has happened in 18 months and during this period WeP has increased its sales and marketing staff, including R&D personnel to 30. The onsite service is termed as WeP Smart division. (See box: WeP customer installations)

WeP’s customers include the likes of IDBI, ICICI Bank and manufacturing companies like Coats India and Arvind Mills. Eureka Forbes, Wipro Fluid Power, St Mark’s Hotel and Gokuldas Images are some of its other customers.

The economics of Print and Save

WeP’s Print and Save is based on the pay-as-you-use model. This model lets customers do their regular printing jobs without actually owning the laser printers. They are therefore free of the burden of maintaining printers and are protected from technology obsolescence. Depending upon their printing requirements, customers can take this service from WeP by depositing a refundable amount of Rs 10,000 for a personal printer, Rs 30,000 for a workgroup printer and Rs 50,000 for an enterprise printer. A counter built at the top of the printer keeps a tab on the number of pages printed. The customer has the option to pay on a monthly or quarterly basis.

End customers should have a print load of at least 40 pages per day at which point it works out to Rs 2 per page. However this cost can be still lower if the print load is heavy. S Srinivasa, manager IS at Gokuldas Images says, "Prior to using WeP services, we were using multiple HP Deskjet printers. We lost control of consumables. We were using 800 cartridges worth Rs 20 lakh in a year. MNC printers cost less but their consumables are expensive. After evaluating WeP services, the company is planning to expand its installation from the initial two to nine other divisions."

Raghavendra Prakash S, chief marketing officer-WeP Smart, WeP Peripherals, attributes the success of the WeP Smart service to 20 promotional events, mainly outdoor campaigns, and the fact that WeP has spent 12 percent of its total revenue in marketing this concept. Prakash says, "We are expecting the Print and Save service to contribute 10 percent of our total revenues three years from now." He adds that in addition to zero risk involved in maintenance of printers and actually investing in it, companies will now be able to measure the cost of printing, which was not possible earlier."

Another first from WeP

Having successfully launc-hed its Print and Save services in the country, WeP is geared up for another innovative offering based on the offsite business model. But this time the services will be targeted to those companies or individuals who do not print on a regular basis and whose print load is not much. A consumer, without investing any money or paying any rental, can print documents, or manuals at a convenient click of the mouse button sitting at home or office. In addition you can give a print command in Bangalore and collect the document in Mumbai, with the choice of printing in colour or monochrome.

How does it work?

If you are a legal or accounting firm and want to print 15,000-20,000 copies to verify accounts or balance sheets, you can queue the print requirement after logging into the WeP owned site, using a dial-up connection. Customers can collect the printouts from WeP’s station in Bangalore. Additionally, this service comes with a basket of offerings. Customers will have the privilege of remote printing without investing in laser printers and can manage their documents from anywhere. Customers can upload three versions of the same document and with the help of software choose the type of printer and the nearest city where they want to collect the documents.

Currently the offsite centre is available only in Bangalore but WeP plans to have 10 such centres across the country by December 2003.

WeP’s leased laser printer options