Top Ten Copier & Imaging Industry Predictions for 2021

@TML ty for the comment Mike!  Hope to meet you somewhere soon one day!

@Joel Salus Ty for the comment all good stuff!

“1. I'll go out on a limb and predict this merger or acquisitions to take place.  Canon & Ricoh will merge or Canon will acquire Ricoh. Currently they are working together in Japan for MFP distribution logistics”

• Considering the continuing trend of people “printing less” rather than “printing more”, I do think it’s inevitable that copier/printer manufacturing consolidation will occur. I don’t know that “this year” will be the year that Canon and Ricoh merge, or one acquires the other, but I would not be at all surprised if this did happen.

“2. Ricoh, Canon, KonicaMinolta, or Kyocera will start purchasing large regional MSP providers”

• Well, since there was a rush, a few years back, for copier/printer manufacturers to buy up their dealers, why shouldn’t there be a next rush where copier/printer manufacturers buy up MPS providers who are customers for their equipment. Heck, years ago, OCE (which is now owned by Canon) purchased Archer Management Services; Archer was never an equipment dealer, Archer was a pure MPS play, one with a national footprint.  And, you could also look back at Ricoh’s purchase of IKON; IKON wasn’t just a copier/printer dealer, IKON had a very significant MPS business segment (nationwide.)

“6. Xerox who is in need of an OEM copier manufacturer will make a purchase to acquire either Toshiba Tec, Sharp from Foxconn or KonicaMinolta”

• Xerox acquiring K/M? That would be very funny! If Xerox acquired KonicaMinolta, Xerox would then be back in the wide-format equipment business, a business that Xerox has exited, at least twice, over the past 11 years. (Some of you may remember that Xerox closed Xerox Engineering Systems. Later, Xerox came out with the wide-format IJP 2000 (Memjet-enabled wide-format b/w and color system; that one went away.)

“7. The year of wide format. More dealers will make the move to offering wide format AEC and wide format color devices this year”

• Well, as a 50+ year veteran of the A/E/C wide-format imaging services industry, I’d like to chime in that the A/E/C sector took a big hitbecause of Covid-19. (Particularly bad in urban markets.  Not as bad in rural markets.)

“8. Ricoh will exit the AEC wide format market place just as they did with duplicators and projectors in 2020”

• Ricoh won’t be missed, at all, in the A/E/C wide-format sector. HP has, due to its success with the HP PageWide XL line, moved into first position, followed by Canon, followed by KIP.

Had a couple extra minutes this morning so I figured I'd chime in with my two cents as it's been almost 13 years of doing this so I feel I may know a little bit.

1. Will be interesting to see if / what happens here.  Both are formidable foes, so to think that one would merge into another or sell out seems highly unlikely.
2. I would say Kyocera would be on the move.  Knowing a local indy who was bought by Kyocera Document Solutions last year, these would seem the most likely to happen.
3. Canon would be your best bet to offer this.  They do it on the higher end devices, so it’s an obvious fit for the lower end.  Seems like it would be an easy enough thing to do.  And if we’re being technical, HP already does this as you need to select the speed after selecting the hardware.
4. Will be interesting to see here.  My bet would be on Dex/Staples.  I could see them approaching several “mega dealers” throughout the country for this partnership with an ever sneaky eye on acquisition of one or all to open up their own dealer channel / outlet in the US.
5. Very good potential here.  Surprised they all haven’t done more of this yet.
6. Or will they die on the vine in the copier world?  Surprised they’re still signing on new dealers and that dealers are actually signing on to sell their product with all that’s out there.  But hey a cheap box to sling is attractive right?
7. Canon will see good growth here as they’ve taken the Oce products away from CSA where dealers didn’t want to sell through because……it’s CSA.  Now it’s offered through the indy channel as the other devices are and dealers are more apt to work with their local wide format specialist from Canon than a CSA (snake).
8. Don’t know anything about the ricoh wide formats so I can’t comment here.
9. A4 really is starting to see more growth.  Canon has got a good bit of commercial A4 units out there and everyone else seems to following suit.  Interested to see that Toshiba is doing their own thing now for A4 versus the Lexmark/brother partnership.  Wonder how their dealers/directs are feeling about that now??  Also curious to know who’s actually making some of these A4’s for the various manufacturers.
10. Dealers have “pivoted” (tired of that word yet?) to other means of earning business which has helped us grow/maintain, but with more vaccinations coming and herd immunity slowly (maybe) occurring, companies are beginning to open their doors again.  Keep the faith, keep pounding those doors and working your connections and good things will come.  If not, follow the beam of light and let them take you to their leader 😊