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34
ACQUISITION
Q&A
Between Apex Consortium’s
acquisition of Lexmark and its
subsequent sale of Lexmark’s
enterprise software business (Kofax,
Readsoft and Perceptive Software)
to Thomas Bravo,
PrintIT Reseller
caught up with Danny Molhoek,
General Manager North West Europe,
to discuss what impact Apex is
having on Lexmark in the UK.
PITR:
What does the Apex acquisition
mean for your resellers and your
customers? What impact has it had
so far?
Danny Molhoek (DM):
When the
acquisition by the consortium led by Apex
Technology was completed, we were in the
middle of Q4. It was business as usual; we
have customers to serve, partners to help,
deals to close, so we just continued with
that. I have to say it was the same in Q1 as
well. We are a UK organisation, within the
larger EMEA organisation, and all these
things are between the US and China. We
just kept on doing what we’re doing, so
there were not many changes there.
But what was very clear from the
guidance we got from our new CEO, David
Reeder, was that he wanted Lexmark to
grow over the next couple of years to
become a large manufacturer in the printing
industry. That is our aim, and I can tell you,
without being able to share any numbers,
that we’re off to a very good start in the UK.
We spoke a lot to our partners in the
December and January time-frame, because
they obviously had many questions about
what the acquisition means for them, and
the message we gave to all our partners
is that the channel has historically been
extremely important to us, it is extremely
important to us today and it will continue
to be so tomorrow.
The partners we spoke to in that period
were all very excited, very enthusiastic.
They see what we’re doing, they like it,
they understand.
What we hope is that Apex Technology
will give the wider Lexmark organisation a
lot of additional capabilities going forward.
One of the things that we see as a big
opportunity, from a worldwide point of
view, is the Chinese market. The Chinese
market is huge and historically Lexmark
has not been a big player in that market, at
least not to the level that we would have
liked.
We believe that being part of the Apex
Consortium will enable us to do much
more business than we’re doing today, and
this will have a positive effect on the wider
Lexmark organisation because we will have
to increase our manufacturing capabilities,
and one of the things that Apex is known
for is its broad manufacturing capabilities.
And in the next 12-18 months, will we see
some additional lines being announced
into the market place, some different types
of product, so in general it is all good.
The motivation at our office is also
extremely high, due to the fact that we
have had a very good start to the year. The
acquisition has helped us tremendously
because it gives lot of confidence to our
partners and our end users that we're in
the game to stay; we are here to stay, we
want to grow, we want to win, and that’s
the message we have been sending out.
With Danny Molhoek, General Manager North West Europe, Lexmark
PITR:
You mentioned some of the new
product lines you'll be introducing
over the next 12-18 months, will they
feature Apex technology?
DM:
With the capabilities Lexmark has, the
R&D that it has done over the last 20-25
years, we’ve taken the lead on a lot of
things. I can’t really tell you whether the
products are going to be 100% Lexmark
and 0% Apex or 90/10 or 80/20, but what
I do know is that our R&D departments
in Lexington are working around the
clock. I’m pretty sure there’s going to be
some kind of influences from Apex as
well, because if you’re part of a larger
consortium that has some other and
maybe better capabilities, why not use
that opportunity. But the roadmap we’re
working on is the roadmap we had before
within Lexmark. The one thing we are
seeing, however, is that everything is going
quicker than we originally anticipated,
which could be due to the manufacturing
capabilities that are now part of Lexmark.
PITR:
Your strategy in the past was
very much based upon acquisition of
software solutions providers. Is that
going to change?
DM:
I don’t believe we're going to acquire
any additional software companies in the
short or near term. We have gained a lot
of knowledge and a lot of capabilities with
our software products, but we also see
that there are some excellent companies
out there providing some very good
products. Sometimes it’s better to have this
knowledge in-house; sometimes it’s better
to join a partnership. Software is absolutely
a key item going forward, but I don’t
expect us to acquire new companies in the
short or near term.
PITR:
You've got a lot to absorb
already.
DM:
Well, it’s been an interesting few
years. And it’s been a very steep learning
curve for us here at Lexmark, where
software has been a key part of our
strategy for the last 20 years. From when
we announced Markvision, we’ve always
been developing those kind of tools
and products. What we have done over
What we
hope is
that Apex
Technology
will give
the wider
Lexmark
organisation
a lot of
additional
capabilities
going
forward
Continued...
Danny Molhoek
