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AUDIO VISUAL
As print volumes decline and printer
vendors diversify to find new sources
of revenue, more and more have
started to add audio-visual and
collaboration solutions to their
portfolios, among them Sharp (see
previous feature), Samsung, Canon
and Ricoh.
Visual solutions are an obvious fit
for these vendors. Conceptually they
are not far removed from printers to the
extent that printers, projectors, displays,
whiteboards and videoconferencing
solutions all provide a means of displaying
and sharing information.
In bringing its collaboration solutions
to market, Ricoh is not restricting itself to
the AV channel, but is encouraging MFP
suppliers and MPS providers to take on the
products as well.
Keith Howell, Business Generation
Director for the Indirect Channel at Ricoh
UK, expects 150 or so of Ricoh’s OA
dealers to sell the company’s audio-visual
and conferencing products, pointing out
that they provide a good way of building
stronger relationships with customers.
“The MPS marketplace is becoming
more and more commoditised and there
has been a land-grab to move customers
from a basic click contract to an all-
embracing MPS offering. For us, the next
step is to link in communication services
to broaden the gains that we can make
for customers in terms of cost savings and
productivity and to make our partners more
‘sticky’ with customers,” he said.
Howell argues that because Ricoh’s
communications solutions help cut costs
and improve productivity, just like an
MPS, adding collaboration solutions to
their existing offering might not be such a
stretch for OA dealers.
“It isn’t wildly different to what our OA
partners currently do with MPS,” he said.
“It’s just a question of upskilling them,
giving them the tools and understanding
so they can also sell our communication
services portfolio.”
Working together
Howell points out that while Ricoh can
supply someone with a videoconferencing
system, projector or whiteboard as a
standalone solution, they really come into
Ricoh is encouraging OA dealers to take on its projectors, interactive whiteboards
and videoconferencing solutions. James Goulding reports
The vision to succeed
to talk through what is being done, they
can do that. Or, if a customer has invested
in videoconferencing or sees the benefit
of moving to VC to eliminate travel costs
and increase productivity, we can supply a
videoconferencing system,” he said.
Interoperable
When Ricoh entered the video-
conferencing market three years ago, its
solutions could only communicate with
other Ricoh devices. Its new generation
systems are compact, portable and
compatible with standards-based solutions
from other vendors. This, says Howell, is
causing sales to really take off.
“Historically, videoconferencing
technology has been very costly – it’s
required a lot of specialist resource in
terms of selling and installation and a lot of
investment from the end customer in terms
of the capital cost of the equipment. The
technology we have now has a lower cost
and more flexibility, so the customer doesn’t
need to have a fixed infrastructure, such as
a videoconferencing room,” he said.
The other reason Ricoh solutions
are popular with SME customers is
their simplicity. “The camera and
videoconferencing technology is all
incorporated in one unit that you can
move from room to room. Connect it to
the network and you are up and running
– there’s nothing else you need to do. And
we have an app that runs on tablets, iPads
and mobile devices that enables mobile or
remote workers to join in,” explained Howell.
Customers buy the all-in-one unit and
on top of that a quarterly or annual airtime
contract for each concurrent user. This
gives the user unlimited airtime and no
additional charges, however much they use
the system. Most importantly, the sale of
airtime contracts gives resellers an annuity
stream into the future.
In addition to its new
videoconferencing system, Ricoh has
expanded its range of interactive
whiteboards with a new 22-inch model
suitable for huddle rooms and smaller
meeting rooms. Ricoh also offers 55,
65 and 84-inch models available with a
mobile stand option so that they can be
wheeled from room to room.
There has
been a land-
grab to move
customers
from a basic
click contract
to an all-
embracing
MPS offering
their own when implemented as part of a
fully integrated solution.
“We very much see these technologies
as working together so that we can help
the customer connect and collaborate
more easily. Our VC system can work with
our interactive projector and our interactive
whiteboards, so you could collaborate
on a document using a whiteboard, and
people at multiple remote sites could
use videoconferencing to look at not
just the document but also the people
and communicate more effectively while
working on a document.
“It’s very joined up from that point
of view. But it is also totally scalable,
depending on what the customer wants.
If the customer just wants to connect a
couple of whiteboards and collaborate on
a document, using their telephone system
