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IT SERVICES
Konica Minolta seeks to reinvent itself as IT services
provider with launch of Workplace Hub
Small and medium-sized businesses
with limited IT expertise are the
target market for a new platform
developed by Konica Minolta to
simplify IT infrastructure and
management and help customers
digitise their businesses.
TheWorkplace Hub is a compact
server/storage/networking unit that
connects to an organisation’s existing
tools, services and devices, providing a
single dashboard for easy management
of the IT infrastructure, plus a range of
IT services delivered by Konica Minolta.
The platform, developed with key
partners HP (server), Sophos (security)
and Microsoft (collaboration and office
solutions), is designed to help SMEs with
their digital transformation now and in
the future.
Konica Minolta says the product
roadmap includes the integration of
technologies such as IoT, AI, Intelligent
Edge and Decision Support as they
become part of the workplace of
tomorrow.
When it is launched in the autumn,
Konica Minolta’s platform will be
available in four versions: the desktop
Edge; the rack Edge; theWorkplace
Hub; and theWorkplace Hub Mini. The
Workplace Hub variants feature an Edge
built into an enclosure beneath an MFP
(A3 and A4 respectively).
While this link with Konica Minolta’s
heritage might raise questions about
reliability and resilience – what
happens if theWorkplace Hub or MFP
needs servicing or replacement? – the
company points out there are practical
reasons for the arrangement; it saves
space in small firms with little room for
equipment and the range of the built-in
WiFi antenna is reportedly better if
located within a printer on the office
floor rather than in a server room.
Removing complexity
Explaining the thinking behind the
product’s development, Jerome-Etienne
Zastrow, Konica Minolta Manager
Portfolio Extension, said: “We had a look
at what work problems SMEs have and
found that the complexity of the IT
environment in a small company is not
much less than in a big company. Yet
the big company has an IT department
staffed with specialists. A small company
or the branch office of a bigger company
generally only has one generalist to cope
with all this complexity.”
Zastrow argues that while IT has
become more connected and less
complex in enterprises, small businesses
have yet to benefit from this trend and
are still having to manage large numbers
of devices and software applications.
“One of the people we spoke to
said he would be happy if he could cut
down from 50 to 15 administration
software applications.We said ‘You’ve
only got 50 people, why do you have
so much to administer?’ and he said
‘Easy.We started with an office in
London and then we bought a company
in Birmingham with a totally different
IT set-up. Then we acquired a small
company somewhere else and they
again had a different set-up’. As a small
company, you can’t immediately renew
the entire IT of the companies involved,
so huge complexity builds up.
“We thought how can we change that.
We looked at all the IT infrastructure in
a company and basically put all those
that are accessed by multiple people in
a box – the server, the storage, theWiFi
networking, security, printers and so on.
Then we created a dashboard that we
put on top so that now the IT generalist
doesn’t have to cope with 10 or 15
Konica Minolta
turns the page
different applications, but just one.
“The second part is that we offer
services around this.We offer to provide
services for everything or just certain
items – the customer can pick and mix.
At the moment, we are offering back-
up and security management, server
management,WiFi management, repair
services, copy and printing services, IT
helpdesk services, and we will add more
services in the future,” he said.
Easy collaboration
The third element of theWorkplace Hub
is Teamspaces, an HTML 5 application
that Konica Minolta has developed to
remove complexity from collaboration.
“Every company we encountered
complained about how difficult
collaboration is, which was interesting
for us because at that stage we weren’t
talking about collaboration but only
IT and infrastructure.We thought
everything to do with collaboration was
solved, but people said there is still a lot
that is wrong,” explained Zastrow.
“So we came up with the idea of
Teamspaces and putting everything to
do with collaboration – text messaging,
video calls, voice calls, file sharing etc. –
under one dashboard.We are not offering
all these services, but are connecting the
tools that a company already uses.We
can connect to Lync, we can connect to
Sharepoint, we can connect toWebex,
we can connect to Google Cloud, we
can connect to Dropbox and so on. This
makes it far easier for non-hardcore
users of these systems, while hardcore
users still get full usage, because it’s just
a connector, a different view.”
This application underlines one of
the attractions of Workplace Hub for
small businesses, which is the potential
to change applications and services at a
pace that suits them.
“There will always be legacy systems
and smaller companies don’t like to be
limited to one vendor,” explained Zastrow.
“The only thing we do is replace the
hardware so you don’t have legacy and
old equipment. And you don’t need to
purchase it – you just rent it per month
per user from us, so there is no upfront
investment. On the software side, you can
keep using what you already use.”
Printer companies have been trying
to reinvent themselves as IT service
providers for a number of years, with
limited success. Could Konica Minolta’s
Workplace Hub be what’s needed to
make that change?
While IT has
become more
connected and
less complex
in enterprises,
small
businesses
have yet to
benefit from
this trend
