Toshiba Launches Dedicated Services Organization
By George Mikolay, Senior Product Editor, A3/Copier
MFPs, October 10, 2012
Toshiba America Business Solutions (TABS) recently
announced the expansion of its core business with the launch of Toshiba Managed
Business Services (TMBS) unit. The new organization, which will be
self-sufficient, will look to strengthen the company’s present business
services offerings in managed print services (MPS), managed document solutions
(MDS), document security, workflow/capture and barcode printing systems. In
addition, TMBS will look to establish a Toshiba U.S. market presence in the retail
kiosks and digital signage business. Its primary focus will be on the
financial, healthcare, education and retail markets.
The new organization, while having its own staff and
operating separately from existing business units and channels, will also
leverage existing strengths at TABS, according to Bill Melo, vice president of
marketing, services and solutions, TABS, and general manager of TMBS. TMBS will
be housed at TABS’ new headquarters in Irvine, Calif., and co-located at TABS
facilities throughout the country. The unit will leverage the existing Toshiba
dealer network for break/fix operation, as well as Toshiba infrastructure for
dispatch and billing operations.
“We’ve had a very successful MPS program, and the way
we went to market with MPS in 2004 mirrors to a degree what we’re doing with
TMBS,” Melo said. “We’re going to bring to market solutions to customers, and
at same time improve the capability of local Toshiba organizations by building
unique customer solutions into repeatable solutions.”
Distinguishing between traditional channels and TMBS,
TMBS is a services organization, and discussions will be around software
solutions and workflow and generally not around hardware. Its principal partner
will be IBM’s former retail store point-of-sale solutions business, which
parent company Toshiba TEC acquired earlier this year. Now known as Toshiba
Gold Commerce Solutions (TGCS), it is the number one market share leader in
point-of-sales systems, having roughly half of the top retailers in the world
at its disposal. Together TGCS will coordinate with TMBS to bring services and
solutions to the customer base.
The organization will also look to help Toshiba
establish more of a presence in the barcode systems and digital signage businesses,
the latter of which Melo sees as a high-growth area, with a 20 percent
compounded annual growth rate. Parent company Toshiba TEC is in the process of
developing its own digital signage solutions largely for the retail space, and
TMBS will be looking to integrate digital signage with point-of-sale systems.
Standing Out in MPS
According to TMBS Director of Enterprise Services
Chris Applegate, the market reality is that the MPS space is very overcrowded.
And while note yet shut, the window of opportunity in MPS is starting to close.
“It’s not just MFP vendors anymore in this space,” Applegate said. “Cartridge
companies, VARs and even large technology distributors are all playing in the
MPS space, and the value proposition is starting to sound more and more alike.”
As Applegate explained, all the players are telling
the same story. In addition to a baseline assessment, which includes an
inventory of all devices and costs associated with them, proposals include
detailed analysis using a network based tool, recommendations for savings,
optimization which typically leads to a right-sizing and refresh of fleet from
higher-cost devices to lower-cost devices, and finally an implementation of a
fleet management system. In the mind of CFO or CIO, they all sound the same.
In TMBS’ proposed philosophy, while MPS is important,
it will only serve as the foundation, or part of the equation. The key value,
according to Applegate, will be in the reduction of printed pages, not just the
reduction of what it costs to produce the printed pages. “While the paper free
office is not possible, an office running on less paper can be a reality
today,” Applegate said. “This is where we will bring real value, in reducing
the overall printed pages.”
Utilizing solutions such as Adobe LeanPrint and
PaperCut MF, TMBS will focus on getting clients to print smarter, optimizing
print and reducing waste. Additional solutions offerings from the likes of Drivve
| Image, DocuWare and Perceptive Software will further help clients with a
transition from the printed page to an electronic one, with basic storage and
retrieval and the automation of intensive workflows.
Less is More
While TMBS will be looking to de-emphasize the printed
page and fundamentally change client content delivery to the electronic page,
Melo did emphasize that the MFP hardware business still represents significant
growth opportunity for Toshiba. As he explained, while the MFP business is
mature and flat, it’s still the largest of the markets the company serves.
“A basic quandary we face is that customers want to
use less of our product,” said Melo. “But to some degree by virtue of our current
hardware market share, there is still an upside for us in preaching the message
of printing less. One, customers do want to print less, so if we meet a customer
need and implement that solution well, we’re going to gain market share. Even
though our customer may reduce printed pages by 40 percent, for us that
customer is still an incremental add-on, and all of that is incremental page
volume. Our share of print will go up even though printing itself is on the
decline.”
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