Convergence Whirlwind

CONVERGENCE is the big word. whether

it is the coming together of voice and data or two giants such as AOL and Time

Warner. While mega-convergence is happening in the bandwidth area, there is a

convergence of a different kind that is in printing technologies-the

applications in the computer peripherals arena. The center-piece of this

convergence is the printer. Increasingly, the movement is towards the

integration of printing with copying, scanning, imaging, internet and networking

technologies. And joining the movement are players from these different spheres

of activities. So much so the future promises managing document flow and

knowledge sharing at the touch of a button, be it paper or digital document,

from the comfort of your living room, a remote area with no PC access, a mobile

telephone or your car.

• Asha reads about this interesting recipe of Indian food on the net and forwards it to her friend in the US who has no access to the computer. Nevertheless, the friend who surfs and checks her email through her digital television, is able to get a printout of the recipe through her printer connected to the TV. 
  
  
  
  

• Courthouses in the United States have already started adopting web-based digital reprographic solutions to streamline legal document submission process, reduce printing costs and provide law offices with ‘anytime, anywhere’ access to legal information. This has reduced the burden of taking nearly 250,000 original pages for processing each year and the annual total copy volume of 480,000 pages in the North Carolina Supreme Court. 
  
  
  
  
  
  
  The process of document management, in paper and digital formats, would not have been managed so easily by Asha or the court houses, but for convergence in printing technologies. The concept of convergence is based on the availability of information in audio, video and text, which needs to be created, distributed and managed both in the corporate sector and at homes. 
  
  
  
  
  
  According to a study by the Delphi Group, in a corporate environment, paper documents contain 24% of the information, while 22% is in the form of electronic documents. Employee brains hold 42% and 12% of the information is stored in the electronic knowledge base from instruments such as data warehousing or mining that give key analysis data.
  
  
  

Need for convergence



Traditionally, processing capabilities and speed of the desktop and workstations have been going up steadily. This has been further pushed by the popularization of the internet. But while changes occurred in these areas, the network did not keep pace with the speeds of the desktop. Even in the case of leased line connectivity of 64Kbps, the network bandwidth has been reduced to as low as 100Mbps because of multi-tasking on the network. This was primarily caused by the number of computer peripheral devices attached to the network, which squeezed up the bandwidth. As a result, manageability of networks became a big issue at the system integrator’s and network manager’s levels. Not only was management and tracking of documents on the network proving to be difficult with functions such as printing, copying, scanning and archiving, but the speed of the network was also brought down considerably. This triggered the efforts towards making network management simpler by integrating computer peripherals into a meaningful system. 

Imagine a typical network of 100 workstations with 10 printers, two scanners and two copiers. The network manager will have to tackle a choking network with multi-tasking happening at different levels and thereby bringing down the network. Also, there was the problem of making each of these devices talk to each other. During the same time, the big shift from paper documents to electronic documents was also happening, thanks to the internet and network technologies. The need for convergence in printing, copying, networking, scanning and faxing became apparent. Around the same time, the vendors started acting on the feedback received from the network administrators. By mid-90s almost all the vendors were busy trying to put together a solution to address some of the user needs and demands. 

Multi-function devices (MFDs)



 The first type of convergence was witnessed with network printing when ethernet and printing were brought together. From there on, one of the early initiatives was from Hewlett-Packard (HP) in the area of printing and copying, with a new product called Mopier–multiple original printer–sometime in 1996. HP’s strategy stemmed from the fact that for every printout, there were multiple copies being taken, thereby making the printer market only as small as about one third of the overall paper document market. And two reasons that were driving the need for copying were lower cost of document production and speed. 

Along the same time, the vendors also started integrating different peripheral applications into one device called the MFD, also known as all-in-one. In a span of less than three years, almost all the vendors came out with such MFDs, high speed network printers and so on, to cater to customer demands. Nevertheless, technology has not taken off as yet since the cost of buying individual components is still cheaper than buying the consolidated device. “A technology will not take off until two things happen. One, it gains global acceptance as a technology from a vendor’s perspective. And two, customers really see cost-effectiveness in going for an MFD,” explains Princy Bhatnagar, Market Development Manager, DeskJets, HP India. “On the one hand, there is convergence at the hardware level, which is seen in the end-user devices. On the other hand, convergence is happening in software and solutions in order to make the drivers where all the functionalities are integrated,” explains Anupam Adeeb, Product Manager, Printing Systems Division, IBM India. 

Factors driving convergence



Vendors worked out a solution to make MFDs more robust and intelligent. They built a controller within the system, so that it was able to work on different platforms and co-exist with other applications such as ERP, data mining and others. Remarks Tarun Thadani, National Sales Manager, Printers, Canon India, “I think there are three key drivers for every kind of IT business, including the convergence business. First, the internet, second, the PC boom and the emergence of the home-SOHO segment, and these are also driving convergence in printing technologies.” There have also been interesting initiatives from the vendors’ side in areas such as post-scanning, archiving, distributing and printing, print-on-demand and others from such players as HP, Xerox, Canon, IBM, Lexmark and Samsung. Definitely, all the vendors have a strategy in place and are putting their acts together to work on this segment. Moninder Jain, Business Manager, Printer Division, Samsung India, confirms, “Samsung is one of the few players internationally as well as in India whose printer division handles printers, faxes as well as MFDs. The main point here is that there is one single division, and not three divisions, just because we look at this as one market. If not now, then definitely two years down the line, integrated machines are going to be in demand across segments.” In keeping with this trend, Samsung is working on products related to processing converged data, including audio and video. “The big picture is a convergence of computers, communications, consumer electronics and content services,” reveals Moninder. 

Importance of convergence



HP has recognized convergence as a specialized activity and therefore has spun-off a separate division–Personal Systems Appliances division. “Its only responsibility is to look at convergence technologies and how they could impact various business forms,” he says. Vendors have also segmented the market into consumers and corporates to offer different solutions. Says Frances Duggan, GM, Lexmark, Indian sub-continent, “For the SOHO market, we recognize the ability to have one footprint and enable fax-photocopying-printing as a convenience. While for the business community, whose major investment is in the technology platform, in the level of software for applications, networking and global business, MFDs are one part of the solution. For that customer, the most important thing tends to be–how does your device fit into my environment? Is it manageable? Do I have to physically visit the device? Can I manage it remotely? Or are you only working with the future of my technology platform? For such customers, the ability to have tools that support their WAN, their investment in intranets and also support the web direction that the customer is going.” She adds that the impact of color is one of the major focus areas within the convergence arena, where color must integrate smoothly into the customer’s environment. 

Looking at the whole gamut of convergence from a different perspective is Xerox. Xerox’s entry into the convergence business started with competition in print versus copy and also the shift from hardcopy to digital documents. “What we started noticing was that there was a major shift occurring in the way people were using documents. In the sense, if there is a volume shift that is occurring, approximately about nine to ten times, along with that the usage of document is also changing. For example, the paper document in 1990 was 9% of the cake size, which is shifting to approximately 30% of the cake size by 2001. Now that is a major shift. Rest of it is all turning digital. Now when the documents turn digital, the whole usage and handling of document changes,” explains Aloke Chatterjee, GM, Sales Training, Xerox Modi Corp. 

The focus of Xerox therefore has been to make sure that there are solutions available, which will be able to track these documents, after they are digitized and launched. Xerox has a 100% holistic approach to convergence, including hardware, software and network management. With the ‘anytime, anywhere’ needs driving the market, Epson has devised a two pronged strategy for the convergence business. “We are working both internally and in partnership with Sun Microsystems to achieve results in the convergence area,” says Paramjit Singh Puri, CEO, Epson India. Epson is working actively on the Jini concept to have printing applications on consumer devices such as digital cameras and mobile phones. “On the other hand, we are also working on MFDs within the company to cater to the workgroup area,” he adds. Canon has worked out its strategy on the PC-less era premise, and is working on getting PC-less printing solutions such as the living room printer and internet printer for the consumers while focusing on the high end MFDs for the corporates. Thadani remarks, “We are also working a lot on color, imaging and scanning to integrate color in the convergence concept.” Although the movement has just begun worldwide on a focused strategic direction towards convergence in printing technologies, user demands and requirements are propelling the growth of such products.

Users feel the need



Even in the Indian market, users have begun to feel the need for convergence products. Says CR Narayanan, Company IT Manager, ABB Alstom Power, “Reliability of the device, network choking, network printing throughput and speed of printing in the networked environment, are key issues affecting the business performance. And hence we would need solutions or products to address their demands.” Though insignificant in volume by today’s standards, the outlook of MFDs is beginning to be noticed. Not only have all the vendors launched new products in the MFD category in India, during the last one year, vendors have also launched more advanced models in the MFD category. MFDs are also coming in with software solutions and addressing serviceability issues in the Indian market. In a country like India with a huge geographical spread, the products in the convergence front seem to be looking up. 

Akila Subramanian



in Chennai