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direct sales
Print.IT Reseller
30
Opportunity or threat?
Resellers who visited BETT 2013 at
ExCel, London may have done a double
take as they passed stand B338, not so
much for the demonstration of origami
on display but out of recognition of
a famous office equipment brand
enjoying a renaissance in the UK.
Triumph-Adler was created from the
merger of Triumph and Adler in 1957, but
its genesis stretches back to the end of the
nineteenth century when the two founding
companies started manufacturing bicycles
and typewriters. They later diversified into
motorcycles and cars, but remain most
famous for typewriters sold under the Adler,
Imperial, Royal and Triumph brands.
Since 1957, TA Triumph-Adler (it acquired
the TA pre-fix in 1984) has been owned by
a variety of companies including Grundig,
US office equipment giant Litton Group,
Volkswagen, Olivetti and most recently
Kyocera, which became the majority
shareholder at the end of 2008 and the
outright owner in October 2010.
Following the decline of its typewriter
business in the late 1980s and an
unsuccessful attempt to become a
manufacturer of notebooks under Olivetti’s
stewardship in the early ‘90s, TA Triumph-
Adler was effectively run as a distributor
of office equipment and then as a holding
company with interests in a number of
industries, including the sale and servicing of
copier and fax systems.
In 1999, one year after the production
of its last typewriter, TA Triumph-Adler
opened a new chapter in its history with
the purchase of printer and copier supplier
UTAX and its reinvention as a document
solutions specialist. TA Triumph-Adler is now
the largest document solutions provider in
Europe. In Germany alone it has 35,000
TA Triumph-Adler (UK) managing director Shaun Wilkinson tells
PrintIT Reseller
why UTAX dealers should welcome not fear the
direct sales operation
customers, more than 200,000 devices under
management and a turnover of 400 million
euros.
Direct sales operation
One year ago, it set up a direct sales division
in the UK to run alongside UTAX (UK) Ltd,
which has maintained a UK presence since
1989 and sells exclusively through resellers.
TA Triumph-Adler (UK) managing director
Shaun Wilkinson told
PrintIT Reseller
that
having a direct sales operation would enable
TA to compete for more contracts and give
parent company Kyocera another route to
market in the UK, alongside the Kyocera
and UTAX dealer networks and an OEM
arrangement with Olivetti.
“Kyocera Corporation in Japan sells its
machines to Kyocera Europe, Kyocera Asia,
Kyocera America and TA Triumph-Adler.
They view TA as important to their business
because they want two bites at every cherry.
We talk a lot with Kyocera, but ultimately we
are competitors,” he said,
But is TA Triumph-Adler (UK) also
competing with the UTAX dealer network?
On this question, Wilkinson is adamant that
there is no conflict of interest.
“Four or five years ago TA expanded into
Austria and Switzerland and it was always
something we wanted to do in the UK. The
aim was to have it under the control of UTAX
in the UK, rather than as a separate business,
so we would have control and a clear no-
competition agreement with the channel,”
he said.
“It makes no sense to compete against
a dealer. There are 220,000 units projected
to go into the market next year, so there is a
lot of scope to win business without going
against our dealers. We have already had
one instance where we were approached by
a customer and found that a UTAX dealer
was the incumbent supplier: we are now
supporting that dealer in the tender.”
Supporting UTAX dealers
Wilkinson contends that far from being a
threat, the direct operation could actually
help dealers win business by giving them
access to TA’s expertise in software, managed
print services, maintenance and support.
“I think it’s important to have both direct
and indirect operations, as there are a lot
of interchangeable skills between the two.
Because we have TA, we have been able to
set up a direct servicing functionality that
can also support a dealer’s business. We
have 2,000 machines under contract through
our dealers because we can offer better
service at a better price than they are able to
do themselves,” he said.
He added that TA could compete for
large deals that a dealer might not have
the financial muscle to deliver and bring in
a dealer for fulfilment and servicing; or do
things the other way round and provide an
MPS on a dealer’s behalf.
“We invested a lot of money two years
ago as part of the TA start-up in software
products so we can remotely manage
fleets. Every device is remotely managed
and monitored and toner gets delivered
automatically,”Wilkinson said.
Whether dealers do it themselves
or make use of TA Triumph-Adler’s
infrastructure, JIT toner delivery is a great
money saver as it ensures that a supplier’s
cash is not tied up in consumables that
disappear or sit unused on customers’
premises. According to Wilkinson, this can
cost large dealerships hundreds of thousands
and even millions of pounds.
Over and above that, TA’s MPS
infrastructure and software will enable UTAX
dealers to find new sources of revenue.
“We started pushing MPS five years ago
and some dealers really got into it. They are
bigger and making more profit because they
are capturing more clicks. They also have
document management products they can
sell and the service revenue that comes from
supplying those contracts,”Wilkinson said.
Momentum is building for TA Triumph-
Adler in the UK – Wilkinson expects it to
break even this year and move into profit
in 2013/14 – but for the time being it will
continue to play second fiddle to UTAX.
“In the UK & Ireland, dealers still account
for 90% of our business and we want to see
that grow. Beyond that, TA has a big future,”
Wilkinson said.
Shaun Wilkinson:
“It makes no
sense to compete
against a dealer”
No threat:
The Triumph-Adler
team assemble
their new
economy range.