PCR Tech and IT retail, distribution and vendor news
“With a number of vendors up for sale or recently sold, consolidation remains a key theme in the print market,” Brother UK’s MD Phil Jones has told PCR.
The firm has revealed that managed print services is Brother’s fastest growing area.
“We are closing significant MPS contracts with an excellent and healthy pipeline, the latest being for over 2,000 devices in a multi-site environment,” said Jones.
Brother currently offers a cloud-based basic print service as well as ‘more sophisticated’ managed print service options, including pre-print, device optimisation/design, deployment and management.
But Jones said there are still plenty of options and opportunities around MPS.
“There is still plenty of opportunity out there, particularly in the SMB space. At the high end enterprise level, customers are well served and mostly already under contract so the battleground remains in the small business sector,” he told PCR.
Despite overall unit volumes being down by single digits, Jones said that print volumes seem stable: “It seems people are printing about the same on fewer devices supporting how many more workgroup printers are being sold.”
With regards to how the print market has changed over the years, Jones explained that devices are faster, smarter and cloud connected, which opens up real opportunity for them to be more associated with workflow (input/output).
“Our own devices have an open interface where developers can customise the user panel to get one touch ‘scan to’ functions, feature lock or menu customisation.
“This means that the devices can be scoped much more easily for specific environments where – for example – limited feature access is required due to security issues.
He concluded: “The more resellers understand about these types of features, the more opportunity for device refresh within their customers will occur.”
Look out for our in-depth feature on the future of the print market in the next issue of PCR.
