Nube Print Report July 2011

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NubePrint REPORT

MPS COMPLIANT - ANALYSIS OF PRINTER / COPIER MODELS

July 2011

MPS is a business that depends on the capacity of the printer or copier to be monitored from remote,

combined with the capabilities of the service provider to deliver supported by the right technology.

The NubePrint Report measures to which extend the most frequent network printer and copier models are MPS ready. The analysis is fully independent to printer and copier vendors, and is based on actual data from printer models in a life MPS environment. The data contained in the graphs should be relevant enough. Narratives are provided just as guidance for a better understanding of the graphs. This report provides relevant information to printer and copier vendors, MPS service providers, future MPS providers, end-customers and in general anyone interested on getting inside information of the MPS business. The NubePrint Report will come out every six months on the first month of each semester, in order to

facilitate the most updated information and the market trend.

Any related question regarding the NubePrint report can be sent to [email protected].

Definitions:

Managed Print Service Association (http://yourmpsa.org/) defines “Managed Print Services is the active

management and optimization of document output devices and related business processes” .

MPS compliant status is the ability for a document output device to be fully serviced by a service

provider remotely with zero intervention from the printer or copier user. As a consequence, only

network connected models are considered.

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Each device is graded according to the following criteria:

No MPS: the lack on providing relevant data makes the device model not suitable for MPS. This

device model cannot be part of an MPS solution.

Major issues: the device has limitations to the extent that it produces a severe impact on costs

control and therefore on the profitability of an MPS program on this printer/copier model. MPS

workload full automation is not possible.

Medium issues: the device has limitations to the extent that it does produce an impact on costs

control, although the impact on the profitability can be limited. MPS workload automation is

possible only partially.

Minor issues: the device has limitations to the extent that it prevents from providing certain

MPS services like maintenance, billing per page color and monochrome separately, or printer /

copier identification.

Full MPS compliant: the document output device model can be fully managed automatically for

MPS. Costs and profitability are under control. Workload is fully removed (tasks can be

automated).

Limitations of the analysis:

The analysis focuses on the ability of the printer to provide enough data so that a good MPS technology

can potentially drive the services. The quality of the data provided is ignored working under the

assumption that it is stable and accurate.

NubePrint report does not take into consideration the technology used by the service provider to

handle MPS services. It is assumed that if the device can provide the data, the service provider will find

the right technical resources to trigger the service.

This analysis has been performed over 500 document output device models of 17 different vendors. All

models have been analyzed using an average of 18 individual units each.


The models analyzed are

classified in 4 different

types: monochrome

printers, color printers,

monochrome MFP

(multifunctional) and color

MFP. 38% of the

population analyzed is

MFP while 62% is printer,

divided almost by halves

between monochrome

and color.


Market compliance:

Overall:

The overall picture of the population analyzed shows that 41% of the models are full MPS compliant,

while the remaining 59% have some kind of limitations. There has been no models identified not

compliant to MPS, meaning having a showstopper for MPS.

While 51% are models for which

an MPS service can be delivered

with no serious impact on the

profitability of the service itself,

49% do require a much

advanced technology that

would some-how compensate

the lack of the device model

capability for MPS. In other

words, half of the models

analyzed do expose the service

MPS provider to risks in terms

of the quality of the service and

profitability or competitiveness.

These models are significantly

less efficient in controlling the

device needs, the associated costs, and in terms of managing remotely in an automated way.

Per type of device:

The limitations found per type of device make the single function printers as the most MPS friendly

devices: 49% are full MPS ready, compared to 29% of the MFP. Color printers get the highest level with

52%. Monochrome MFP get the worst results: 41% do show major limitations to MPS. Comparing color

and monochrome devices, color get the best results with 45% showing full MPS capabilities and just 6%

with major limitations. 38% of monochrome devices are full MPS ready, while 37% do show major

limitations.


Per vendor:

Figure 5 represents the detail per vendor. It immediately raises the attention how different each one

positions. The greener is the bar of a vendor, the more MPS friendly are its printer and copier models. It

is relevant the fact that there is no significant difference if the vendor origin is copier industry or printer

industry, although we would have tendency to think that copier vendors should be in a more advanced

position.

The area of the most advanced MPS compliancy is populated by vendors like HP, Sharp, Epson or Dell.

On the opposite side are Gestetner and Brother. The middle range is covered by companies like

Lexmark, Ricoh or Oki.


Type of limitations:

Limitations to MPS ready are driven by the capacity of the device to provide relevant data so that an

expert MPS technology can automatically trigger and manage the services. The data required has been

grouped in the following major categories:

Black toner / ink level

Color toner / ink level

Other consumables level (drums, developers, kits…)

Access to the display of the device

A separate color counter

s/n identified


Overall:

Figure 6 is showing how frequently each type of limitation is found among the device models having

limitations.

Other consumable level is not available in 34% of the devices. More surprising though is that 25% of the

printer and copier models analyzed do not show the black toner / ink level. And even more relevant is

that 10% of the color devices do not provide a color counter and 11% do not provide levels for the color

cartridges.

Per type of device:

The bars on the figure bellow do show similar distribution for MFP and their correspondent printer.

Color printer and color MFP have a similar distribution of missing data. Something similar can be said for

the monochrome printer and the monochrome MFP.


Color device models do frequently miss the level of other consumables (54%), and the color counter

page(23%). In the case of monochrome devices the most frequent limitation is the lack of black toner /

ink level (39%).

Per vendor:

An analysis of the limitations per vendor reveals the weaknesses of each one in terms of being MPS

compliancy. Some vendors can make a big step forward by just focusing on a specific aspect; as for

example, Lexmark would remove 80% of its limitations to MPS ready product by just ensuring that level

is provided to non toner consumables.

The picture for other vendors do show a more complex situation, where no specific limitation concept is

assuming a prominent role. This is the case for example of HP and Gestetner.


Conclusions:

The explosion of MPS demand during 2010 should be followed by an effort from the printer and copier

vendors to have their products MPS compliant. With only 41% of the models analyzed being fully

compliant, there is room for improvement. If this does not take place, the demand may long term be

redirected to those devices that can be efficiently managed by the service providers. But meanwhile a

bad experience from the end customer due to a deficient service may cause a negative impact on the

growth of the market.

NUBE PRINT, S.L.

www.nubeprint.com email: [email protected]

Phone: + 34 910.010.247

http://www.nubeprint.com/

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Nube Print Report July 2011