Printing & Imaging

Printing & Imaging: Capture, print and keep

Laser printers are more popular than ever, colour is everywhere and digital photography— like e-mail before it—is only spurring the use of printers. By Faiz Askari

It’s a digital world—whether you are taking a photograph or communicating with a colleague, chances are that you will be using an electronic medium to do so. That does not mean, however, that paper is passé. The fact is that the use of e-mail in an organisation causes an average 40 percent increase in paper consumption and that digital photographs get printed—a lot.

As per MAIT’s recent report, overall printer sales in India stood at 7.6 lakh units growing by 4.4 percent during H1 2006-07 over the same period in fiscal 2005-06. Moreover, the study also forecasted that printer sales will cross 18 lakh units in fiscal 2006-07.

Sales of laser printers grew 46 percent in H1 to reach 2.2 lakh units. Sales to large enterprises grew by 142 percent and those to small enterprises by 6 percent. On the other hand, sales declined by 2 percent in the case of medium enterprises. Laser printer consumption has been impressive, with these being preferred over inkjets and dot-matrix printers, especially by large enterprises. 5.5 lakh laser printers are projected to shift during FY 2006-07.

Natesh Mani, Executive Director, New Office Group, Xerox India Limited says, “Advances in office automation have played a pivotal role in revolutionising the use of office space in India. In addition, the increased expenditure on IT infrastructure has enabled offices to evaluate new options and go in for solutions that enhance their productivity such as multi-functional devices and products with customised features.”

At the same time SMBs are becoming more inclined towards investing in imaging and printing infrastructure.  

With PC penetration increasing, Vishal Sriwastv - Country Manager, Brother International (India) Pvt. Ltd expects that the printer market will also pick up correspondingly.  Sriwastv says, “From a current 1:7 printer to PC attachment ratio (one printer sold for every seven PCs), with falling prices, we expect that the ratio will come to about 1:3 or 1:4.”

Ram Agarwal MD and CEO of Wep Peripherals says, “The market is becoming more price conscious. Customers don’t want to invest on printers as standalone devices, they want advanced printing solutions.”

Digital imaging

The global digital imaging market is projected to grow to $31 billion by 2009 with the Middle East and Asian markets claiming a 33 percent share against the current 10 percent. This market segment is growing steadily in India.

Dhiren Singh, Assistant Director of Marketing and Consumer Imaging Canon India says, “Sales grew around 100 percent in 2006 over 2005 and it is anticipated that by end 2007, the Indian digital camera market will be close to 9,00,000 units. In other words, the 100 crore digital camera market in 2004 will grow to a 600 crore market in 2007. Canon’s market share in the digital camera category was 19 percent in 2006.”

In Q4 2006, the digital camera category had grown by 64 percent over Q4 2005. The digital camcorder category grew by 116 percent in the same period.

The focus is shifting to how to help consumers save, organise and share their digital memories. Printing digital images will be the next step with consumers going to retail locations to obtain keepsakes of their memories. Ravi Karamcheti, Managing Director, Kodak India says, “We see India emerging as a key market for personal technology and as more images are being created and there is an untapped potential for the same to be printed. We believe that the future of digital imaging lies in printing. The potential of growth in printing digital images is seen due to many factors including high-resolution digital cameras and camera phones, a niche that is growing at a very quick rate in India.” 

Karamcheti says, “We have the widest category of cameras across all price points and with easy to use features. The entry-level models are designed in such a user-friendly manner that a first time user switching from an analogue camera to a digital one finds it very easy to do so.”

Ravi Aggarwal, President - Imaging & Printing Group, Hewlett—Packard India Sales Pvt Ltd says, “In the personal printing space, people today want instant gratification and the best quality at a fast pace. Hence we are seeing high demand for simple, instant and high quality photo printing especially with the growth in digital cameras and mobile phone cameras.”

The laser age

Laser printers have emerged as the most sought after, mainstream printing device. With the market continuing to be stimulated by falling prices and improved technology, it seems inevitable that the laser printer will soon become as commonplace and indispensable as the photocopier. Mani says, “Xerox India’s unit shipments for laser printers grew from 1,817 in Q1, 2005 to 9,052 in Q1, 2006.”

Emphasising the market positioning of laser printers, Sriwastv says, “Laser printers are gaining in momentum on account of the high quality printing, the fact that they take up less space and that the running cost (toner) is lower. Demand for laser printers has increased in the enterprise, on account of low total cost of ownership and operating cost both prime concerns when it comes to high-volume printing.”

The emergence of colour

Colour printing is fast gaining popularity and colour laser printers are being used to output documents and graphics across industry sectors. It has become more affordable and the ratio of B&W to colour printing is 4:1 as opposed to 20:1 some years back. Looking ahead, colour lasers will become available to more businesses as printing in colour becomes more affordable.

Agarwal of Wep Peripherals says, “The enterprise segment is showing interest in this area. Production in colour is going to grow maybe even in double-digit figures. Greater Internet usage in the enterprise is resulting in a growing need for colour printing.”

Aggarwal of HP says, “We have seen a surging demand for colour printing in the office with appropriate controls over usage, accurate tracking of hardcopy usage and cost allocation, securing of printed output to avoid wastage and protection of confidentiality.”

Sriwastv says, “Customers are being wooed through factors like price, value, ease of use, quality of output and the use of graphics in presentations. People are now concentrating on factors such as the total cost of ownership, rather than just plain asset ownership of a printer.”

This has lead to increasing acceptance of laser printers over inkjets. Mani says, “2006 saw inkjet technology facing tough competition from laser technology with SMBs, SOHO and corporate segments all preferring the latter due to its higher level of efficiency, lower total cost of ownership, high quality prints, space saving, ease of use and value.”  

N Samba Moorthy - General Manager, Sales & Marketing, Epson India says, “Most CIOs have realised that after optimising their network/server/desktop requirements the only recurring requirement is for storage and printing solutions.”

CIOs appear to be selecting printing equipment based on the running cost, repair cost and after sales support. Moorthy adds, “To support this printers are coming with network ready features which can be deployed in shared mode thereby reducing the number of printers that are required.”

Low cost manageability

Aggarwal of HP says, “Enterprise customers have realised the need to manage their overall IT infrastructure including imaging and printing devices. The Total Print Management business model pioneered by HP has helped our customers reduce costs by around 30 percent on an average.”

HP has the Universal Print Driver (UPD) and WebJetadmin software which virtually eliminates the need for IT staff to manage individual print drivers by providing one single driver and interface for all networked HP printers or multi-function peripherals.

Affordability drives the printing market. Moorthy says, “Printers continue to get faster, better and more affordable. One of our key focus areas has been inks– what we believe to be the heart of the printer. We introduced low cost inks for price conscious consumers. Priced at just Rs. 250 a cartridge this has opened up the market for consumers and helps them stick to using genuine inks and not get lured by compatibles and refills.” 

In terms of manageability Karamcheti says, “With our offerings it becomes easy for anyone to take, print, share and store digital pictures. People are taking more snapshots of everyday moments, easily storing and organising pictures and printing at home with the touch of a single button.”

Vis-a-vis cost effective offerings, Karamcheti mentions the Kodak Picture Kiosk which is a pedestal-style digital system with a smaller footprint and weight, and is ideal for retailers who have not traditionally been able to justify on-site digital printing services. In addition to this, retail printing offers convenience to many customers who do not want to purchase a photo printer but still need to take prints of their photos. The service is available at 50,000 outlets spanning 330 towns.

Value added printing solutions

Customers are demanding solutions for their on-the-job challenges and not just printers or scanners. This solution-orientation is driving the movement from monochrome printing to colour and from single- to multifunction devices.

Singh of Canon says, “Data has always been an invaluable component in the enterprise sector and much depends on how fast it is converted into usable information. This is where printing comes into picture. Printing has evolved tremendously in the enterprise segment. In fact, CIOs are looking at adopting the concept of output management in order to bring down print expenditure.”

In addition to this, trends like cluster printing, document accounting, job accounting, production tools, wireless printing technologies and various print management solutions are meant to increase control over vital enterprise activities such as printing, reprinting, output archiving, automated output distribution and handling forms. Singh added, “Cluster printing can prove to be invaluable in a business environment, for e.g., they combine resources and increase productivity. It leads to a greater Return on Investment (ROI).”

Highlighting the role of innovative technology that is changing almost every day and convergence which has became the buzzword of today’s market, Sriwastv predicts, “Keeping this and futuristic technologies in mind, vendors are embedding these into the design of devices, be it a PC, laptop, mobile phone, palm top or a digital camera. One of the biggest trends, evident in the Indian market, is that the prices of desktops, laptops and other computing devices have come down drastically, and this has helped increase the addressable market.”

This has also boosted the computer peripherals market in general and that for printers in particular. The PC to printer attachment ratio has improved over the past year.

Customised printing

This trend is accelerating and it reflects the ongoing shift from mass production to mass customisation. High-end capabilities are moving down market—creating new markets and new opportunities. Books and newspapers on demand are two examples. They are now available anytime, anywhere—with customised content. Build-to-order is the order of the day. Mani says, “Companies operating in this space have to use information and communications technology to gather customer data and get to know the person behind the account number. The next step is using that information to create more relevant offers, and personalised service—so that the loyalty of each and every customer grows.”

Experts have found that when an individual’s name is added to a printed page, response rates go up by 44 percent. Mani adds, “When a name and colour are added, response rates go up by 135 percent. When the person’s name is added in colour and the content is customised, the response rates go up by over 500 percent.”

Highlighting in colour which can speed up bill payments by as much as 30 percent. With on-demand Xerox digital colour, customers can drastically reduce offset printing costs and the associated warehousing expenses.

Singh says, “Customers are demanding solutions to business problems, not just devices. The key to understanding how business printing and imaging are changing lies in looking at what customers actually want from their communications technology going forward. An effective enterprise will successfully tap its information to improve business decision-making.”

The trends with respect to the customised printing are:

• Service-oriented businesses use streamlined imaging and printing to enhance their value to customers
• Marketing pages are moving in-house as colour lasers are approaching the quality of traditional commercial printers
• Colour is increasingly leveraged for powerful business communications

Outlook for 2007

Globally, MFDs have caught up with standalone inkjet printers, and lasers are also picking up.  The adoption of lasers as a mainstream printing technology globally and improvements on the output front have ensured a remarkable drop in the price-performance ratio. Sriwastv predicts, “This in turn has further fuelled the acceptance of lasers and mid-range inkjet printers are under threat. With the narrowing price barrier between stand-alone inkjet printers and lasers, this is expected to boost the market for laser printers.”

He adds, “We announced technologies, such as a newly developed ink-jet head that supports high-speed printing and energy conservation.”

Xerox believes that the digital printing industry has huge potential. It is betting big on verticals like telecom, banking, insurance, retail, manufacturing and graphic communications. Currently, 70 percent of the telecom bills in the country are printed on Xerox digital presses and the company also caters to 90 percent of the private sector banks in India for printing statements and personalised chequebooks. Xerox has also recently invested Rs 5 crores to set up the Xerox Innovation and Technology Excellence Centre in Gurgaon which has high-end production equipment on display.

Karamcheti says, “We have only recently started selling kiosks in India. As of date there are 15 units installed across Delhi, Mumbai, Kolkata, Chennai and Ahmedabad. It will take some time before picture kiosks catch up with the Indian consumer as the first step is to get people to the kiosks and let them experience the features for themselves.”