Change to survive

At one time inplants were a threatened species, seemingly destined for extinction as corporates, local authorities and educational bodies closed down the dingy operation in the bowels of the building in favour of printing that could be produced on a desktop and outsourcing anything that couldn’t.

Today, however, those in authority are waking up to the realisation that this is an expensive path to follow and that only single copies should be printed on the spot while it is cheaper to produce anything else under the control of a central department. Further the old basement filled with ancient Multiliths, Ryobis and AB Dicks, has been replaced by the clean lines of production digital presses. Some have the latest in Xerox iGens, HP Indigos and if they stay with litho, the cleaner to operate Presstek waterless DI press is a popular option.

With digital has come new ways of working and new opportunities for the inplant manager willing to promote the capabilities of his department within his organisation. Where this has been done, the inplant has been revived, often under a snazzy new name and remit to be in charge of corporate communications and more. Where this hasn’t been done by the organisation itself, there is a whole queue of printer suppliers ready to offer the organisation a managed print service. This has become big business for the likes of Xerox, Konica Minolta, Ricoh and so forth. HP wants to become involved and so too does Canon. The substantial presence of Océ in this sector will not have gone unnoticed to the Japanese company which is aiming to complete its takeover of the Dutch digital supplier in the new year.

Canon is preparing the way in this direction by carrying out research into the future of the Corpoprate Reprographics Department. (Like the difference between ‘sheet’ and ‘page’ or between ‘perfecting’ and ‘duplexing’, there is a different language employed by those looking at the sector from the perspective of a digital supplier to that of the litho supplier who still thinks of the inplant department.) This was published earlier this year and has captured a moment of transition between the old style passive operation and one which plays a much deeper role in the life of the host enterprise.

From this Canon has drawn some observations about prospects and how it feels the CRD needs to change. Now Ricoh is part way through a similar exercise intended to understand the needs of inplants (and therefore how Ricoh needs to respond in order to meet these needs). “We are doing a printroom survey in order to understand the pressures, the challenges and the pain points so that we can help them in future,” says Professional Print Solutions manager Karen Lawrence. “We need to raise the profile of print rooms and to make sure that they are seen as a strategic corporate asset, something that adds value rather than something that is in the basement.”

The research is taking in face-to-face interviews with senior print room managers, completion of 200 surveys and telephone research. The results, to be unveiled first to those that have participated in the questioning, will be used to set up packages to help the inplants market their facilities within the host organisation. It will involve elements of running the copier/printer fleet to manage how individuals are allowed to print and which devices are available.

The growth of interest in reducing environment impact has proved an opportunity for the inplant. It can offer greater transparency over materials used, whether sustainably sourced or recycled, and it can reduce the amount it prints without inflicting harm on revenues. Indeed bringing work into an inplant is a strategy many are using to deliver improved environmental performance.

In many organisations there is a split between IT which can be responsible for desktop printers and the CRD, responsible for central print. The difference is not always respected by those working there, adding to any friction. But where the CRD takes on the end-to-end responsibility, often in partnership with a supplier able to cover the range of desktop to production printer, the costs comes down and effectiveness can rise. Workflow enhancements will include automatic file submission via a browser on the internal network which can follow rules to select the most appropriate device for any job. It’s about making it simpler to make the right choice, says Lawrence. Equally other printer management systems can allow users to access documents held on a central server and print them in a lecture room or location away from the printroom.

Xerox has always been strong in providing managed print services through its XBS division to serve the very largest organisations. The lessons are being applied in a different approach that it calls Enterprise Print Services. The aim is to control the whole print environment that a company might have, including managing the print habits of home workers or the manager that needs to print out the 500pp report that he has been working on away from the office. It also includes management of work that needs to be outsourced with Xerox having a list of approved suppliers (not necessarily Xerox users) to call on says Xerox’s Andy Davies, The concept was rolled out first in the US with a number of large organisations signing up for the EPS concept. “It’s about the Total Cost of Ownership of print, from the office to material that is beyond the scope of the internal resources. “It’s a holistic approach to printing across the enterprise,” he adds. “We find that when we explain it the more senior people in an organisation ‘get it’, while those further down can feel threatened. That is not the issue.”

As well as saving huge percentages of cost by controlling what is printed, it can also play the environment card. That Xerox sees this as a huge opportunity has been underlined by its bid to buy Affiliated Computer Services, billed as the world’s largest business process outsourcing company, worth something like $6.5 billion. The fit between the two appears on paper at least to be good. And it is a sector reckoned to be growing at 5% a year, compared to the negligible growth rates for print as a whole.

If Xerox is targeting the largest companies in the world with this approach, there is much happening at ground level.

Danwood, which works with Xerox on sales and support in the UK, has been targeting the changing inplant sector. It has close links with three key organisations, Apcom for local authority printrooms, the universities print managers group and that for government departments. Len McIntosh joined Danwood from a local authority so has long experience in the sector. His role is to help inplants make the transition from under-appreciated and neglected entities into integral parts of the organisation they are associated with. “Some are trying to be more commercially aware and more visible”, he says. “If you are not visible and are just waiting for work, you will be overlooked.”

What is needed is to raise the profile of the department, looking for new ways to support the front line services that a council delivers. As an example, he suggests, that the inplant could be producing the exhibition posters that a department might otherwise have to engage an agency to produce. Created internally, the cost is much less.

It is not an easy change for all to make. McIntosh recommends looking for a sponsor, such as the communications department where there is a remit to improve marketing and communications and external suppliers may lack the flexibility than an internal supplier can provide. There is also a logical appeal to procurement heads, but the nub is that the inplant manager must continually work to prove the value of the service provided. “Inplants have suffered from a decline in the number of staff they have and the skills of those staff, so they know they have to do more with less. They need to network to sell themselves to potential users in the organisation. Otherwise the entire process is slower, it’s under-utilised and this adds to the overheads which makes the operation less competitive.

“Inplants need to realise there is lots that they can do over and above producing reports and stationery. They can become custodians of the corporate brand identity, become involved with marketing. But they must also stay up to date in terms of equipment and that requires the support of the organisation to realise that investment will always be required.

“Naturally the inplant needs to be aligned to the direction of the organisation. That said, with a well-run department, the inplant is an opportunity to do more.”

To do this the inplant manager needs to have a commercial awareness that was not needed a few years ago. What is clear is that within any organisation there is more being printed, what is different is the way that the printing is delivered.


Actions for inplants
Think automation: it will allow you to keep the team small by running repetitive tasks
Critical mass: Centralise the most productive printers and take on design and any outsourcing
Be involved: Find a champion to support the inplant and sell expertise at an early stage in any project
Sell, sell, sell: If you are not visible, you will be ignored
Partner with suppliers: They have a vested interest in your success and can help with training and ideas
Prove your value: Using management accounts and ROI. Compare costs with outside suppliers
Drive for quality: Because there is always someone else
Train: Staff for efficiency and job satisfaction and customers to help them choose you
Think communication: Because print is too often considered part of the problem; you need to be part of the solution
Remember: The inplant is part of the organisation. Its aims must be your aims


Thanks to Trevor Dodsworth, Canon UK, and
Len McIntosh, Danwood