Weekend MFP Industry Notes Newsletter
2-6-2011
- Sharp will launch a new series of color laser A3 MFPs (code-named “Aries”) that will have control panels similar to an Apple iPad. Tentative specs:
o 10.1” color touchscreen LCD display
Touch screen responds to same types of gestures used with iPad or iPhone, such as flick, tap, slide and drag
Besides the touchscreen, there are apparently no hard buttons
Display can be configured with icons just like a desktop computer
Sharp sales reps may have a demo LCD to show customers on sales calls preconfigured with icons that relate to their business
o Models are MX-2610N, MX-3110N and MX-3610N
o Range in speed from 26ppm to 36ppm
o Uses new toner technology
o 1200x1200dpi print, 600x600dpi copy
Advertised as offering 9600dpi with interpolation
Max of 4 bits per pixel
o New product will be shown to dealers at the Sharp dealer meeting held at Wynn resort in Las Vegas during week of 3/14/2011
o 4 tandem OPC drum design
o 20 second warmup time from sleep mode
o 6.8 second first copy out time
o Optional 400dpi fax board (options allow for up to 3 fax lines)
Internet fax is option
o Comes standard with document feeder
Holds up to 100 originals
Top scan speed of 50opm b/w and 36opm color
Does NOT scan both sides of original at same time
o Comes standard with 550 sheet paper drawer and 100 sheet stack bypass
Can add up to three more 550 sheet paper drawers
Optional 4,000 sheet large capacity deck
o Finishing options include:
MX-FN10 booklet making finisher (15 sheet booklet max)
MX-FN17 50 sheet stapling finisher
MX-PNX5A punch kit
o Built-in print controller
Actual maker unknown (most likely Zoran)
1GB RAM
160GB hard drive
PCL print driver standard
• Optional PostScript driver (requires 1GB RAM upgrade)
• Optional XPS driver (requires 1GB RAM upgrade)
• Optional barcode support
IPv6 support
Optional web browse kit
Optional data security kit
Optional proximity card reader
10/100/1000BaseT and USB ports standard
- Sharp reported financials for last 9 months:
o Net sales of 2.32 trillion yen, up 15%
o Net income of 21.8 billion yen compared with prior year’s loss of 8.59 billion yen
o Company reported that it benefitted from increase in sales of LCDs, TVs and Blu-ray players
- According to recent survey of what IT departments acquired in 2010, here is breakdown of top categories:
o 55% = business application software
o 51% = servers
o 39.5% = security
o 37.1% = printers and MFPs
o 35.2% = storage
- Details of survey conducted by Oce’, a division of Canon, regarding electronic document management:
o 77% = improved operational efficiency
o 72% = improved customer service
o 50% = enhanced regulatory compliance
o 21% = increased competitive advantage
o 90% = currently use paper records repository
o 70% = have deployed electronic records repository
o 9% = have deployed document imaging process in mailroom
- In another survey conducted by Oce’ the following is revealed:
o 62% believe economy is growing again
o 29% believe economy will rebound at end of 2011
o 50% believe it will take 3 years to recover
o 52% will have increase in digital imaging spend in 2011
o 38% will spend more on document management software in 2011
- Oce’ announced it sold ColorStream 10000 production color inkjet system to Dai-ichi Hoki, a printshop in Japan for electronic book publishing.
- Fuji announced it sold two Color 1000 production color copiers (sold in U.S. as Xerox Color 1000) to Kwik Kopy in North Sydney, Australia. Fuji claims to have 25 of these now installed in the country.
- Xerox acquired a provider of electronic health records (EHR) solutions to the healthcare vertical:
o Acquired WaterWare Internet Services Inc.
o Based in San Jose, CA
o Specializes in storing EHR data online called Aquifer EHR Edition
o Offers a system that pharmacists can use to manage patients’ prescriptions called Nile Pharmacy
o Will work alongside Xerox DocuShare software
- Xerox announced that it was issued a total of 1,031 patents in 2010, up 46%. The patents are not only from office equipment division, but also from ACS and XMPie divisions.
- Xerox CEO, Ursula Burns, announced she has sold her condominium in New York for $2.5 million. She now lists an address in New Canaan, CT, which is much closer to Xerox’s headquarters in Norwalk, CT.
- Xerox announced it sold a DocuColor 7002 system to LT Print Group of Wirral, England.
- Xerox announced it will use Microsoft’s new Azure cloud computing platform to launch Xerox Cloud Print, a chargeable service that will allow end users to route a printing job to any available public printing, directly from their mobile devices.
- Xerox and data security. Brendan O’Connor of Black Hat USA, published instructions on how to hack into a Xerox WorkCentre MFP, through its Linux based operating system. Details on what he was able to do after hacking in:
o Steal passwords
o Collect all print jobs remotely
o Reset or change meters to affect copy charges from Xerox
o Change default print template, or print random pages
o Firewall network ports
o Schedule random reboots
o Randomly email print and scan jobs to other people
o Make long distance connections with fax modem
o Shut down device
- Xerox announced that it was recognized for the fifth consecutive year by J.D. Power and Associates for providing “An Outstanding Customer Service Experience”. Based on results of a survey of more than 1,000 Xerox customers.
- IKON, a division of Ricoh, announced it now an authorized reseller of Remlox software, which makes remote data forensics products for the legal vertical.
- Ricoh lost a lawsuit it filed against Okidata over alleged patent violations regarding printer/MFP technology.
- Hewlett Packard claims that its new Inkjet Web Presses are printing a total of 1.46 billion letter size pages in 2010, from the 20 units that it installed worldwide.
- Hewlett Packard announced it will spend $100 million to build a data center in Australia.
- The Internet Assigned Numbers Authority (IANA) announced that it only has 5 more IPv4 address blocks left to give out for use. IPv4 address space allows for a maximum of 4.3 billion unique addresses. (This is why customers are moving to new standard, IPv6, and should require that their new MFPs support IPv6 standard out of the box, to prevent product obsolescence)
- Toshiba stated that its last quarter’s operating profit more than doubled on increased sales of NAND flash memory chips and LCD displays sold to Apple for iPad and iPhone products.
o posted a 37.5 billion yen ($456.8 million) profit
o LCDs and flash memory totaled 17.2 billion yen in operating income
- According to Gartner Group, printing revenue is the third highest expense after payroll and rent.
o On average, businesses unknowingly spend 7% to 12% of total revenue on document production, management and distribution.
- Intel announced that it has discovered a design issue in a recently-released chip, the Intel 6 series, code-named Cougar Point. This has caused a massive recall of laptop computers made by Dell, HP, Lenovo and Toshiba.
- A Toshiba senior human resources manager, Elaine Cyphers, filed a lawsuit against the company for $100 million, accusing Toshiba of gender bias against women in pay and promotions:
o contends that Toshiba pays women lower salaries and bonuses than men for similar work
o alleges that company steers women into lower grade positions and favors men in promotions
o “astounding lack of women in leadership positions” according to Ms. Cyphers
o Only 3.4% of Toshiba’s 6,273 managers are women
o “The numbers are atrocious! We believe the class claims are significant, and will be substantiated in the litigation” said attorney David Sanford
o Toshiba spokesperson, Tom Gallatin, stated that Toshiba does not discuss pending litigation.
o The case will be heard in the U.S. District County in New York later this year.
- Toshiba announced that it sold fewer than half the 3D HDTV sets it forecasted in the initial month of sales.
- Toshiba announced it won a $36 million contract from the Department of Defense for radiology systems.
- Equitrac, maker of cost recovery solutions, announced a new option, called TouchPoint Document Capture:
o Option for Equitrac Professional 5 for legal vertical
o Now compatible with OpenText eDOCS DM 5.2 document management software system
o Scan, profile and save documents directly from Equitrac equipped MFP, using external TouchPoint LCD console
o All scanned pages are automatically tracked and capture in Equitrac Professional for cost recovery
- Kofax, maker of document capture middleware software, announced it won a $350,000 contract from Bergelectric of Los Angeles, CA.
- Lexmark reported last quarter’s financials:
o revenue of $1.1 billion, up 3%
o Total laser printer/MFP revenue of $806 million, up 8%
o Profit of $87.6 million, up from $59.8 million
- Allscripts announced it won an EHR contracts from:
o Spring Family Practice of Spring, Texas
o Harrison Medical Center of Washington
- Meditech announced EHR install at Citizens Memorial Hospital of Boston.
- Cerner announced EHR install at NCN Healthcare System of Florida.
- Epic announced EHR installs at:
o Lee Physician Group of Florida
o Lee Memorial Health System of Florida
- According to results of a 3 year study conducted by researchers at Stanford University of Palo Alto, CA, “there is no consistent association between Electronic Health Records (EHRs) and Clinical Decision Support Systems (CDS) and better quality” “These results raise concerns about the ability of health information technology to fundamentally alter outpatient care quality”
- McKesson announced it is partnering with General Dynamics to create an EHR system for the Department of Defense.
- A study published by Health Affairs magazine reveals:
o 64% of doctors have never used electronic health records software in their office
o 42% of doctors would be willing to use EHRs
o 24% of doctors are unwilling to use EHRs
o 49% believe that EHRs would save time or improve relations with patients, or improve accuracy
- HIPAA Data Breach: The Ankle + Foot Center of Tampa Bay, Florida announced that someone hacked into their network and had access to the personal info of 156,000 individuals.
- The top federal official overseeing the EHR push in the healthcare market is resigning. David Blumenthal announced he will step down from his position as National Coordinator for Health Information Technology. He was placed into the position in March, 2009 by President Obama. No replacement yet named.
- Police in Atlanta, Georgia are on the lookout for 4 men who have stolen tens of thousands of dollars worth of printer cartridges from Office Depot stores. Apparently, three of the men come into the store and pepper store clerks with questions to distract them, when the 4th man empties the printer cartridge shelves into a large cardboard box and then sneaks out of store.
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