01732 759725 33 magazine INTERVIEW within reach of more businesses. It’s still early days, but the initial reception has been very strong.” This represents a new opportunity for Epson. So, while established vendors might bemoan a 20-30% drop in print volumes in that core office market, Ferguson says this is less of a consideration for Epson. “We're coming from a base where we’re the disrupter in a very large market. If that large market is 20% lower than before, we're still obviously the disrupter and still growing faster than we were before. We're not so concerned about the movement of the total market; what we're concerned about is making sure that our proposition is well understood out there. Fundamentally, it's a sustainability message and a cost of energy message when you compare our technology to laser-based devices.” Bright spots Epson’s business inkjet market is still growing strongly (in Europe, Epson Office devices are targeted to almost double this year), and there are other bright spots. “The video projection side of the business is still growing. The investment in education continues, which is good for that side of the business. Another thing we've seen this summer is a bounce back on what we call our high brightness projection, which is the very large projectors used in installations in museums, special displays, concerts etc.. People may be reining back their spending overall but going to events and going to museums seems to be the one area that has been very resilient. That business is growing well again after a difficult time during the COVID crisis.” Ferguson adds that there are also developments on the commercial large format and industrial printing side that might cross into the office market. “If a product needs a high technical sell, if it has a significant software management requirement, if it involves pre- or post-processing, then it's better to work with specialists but where it's more plug and play then definitely you can see that overlap into the office space. The SureColor T Series of four-colour large format printers is a good example of where commercial printing is overlapping into the corporate market and where we are increasingly working with and selling through the business print channel.” Ferguson adds that there are also opportunities in retail and small business environments from the development of space-efficient micro-production devices. “Retail always has a strong focus on the amount of revenue per square foot and if you've got a large printer taking up a lot of room, they don't like it, so we’ve focused on making the footprint of devices as small and compact as possible. The production is not what you would get from a centralised production device, but you save in other ways: you're printing on-demand; you're printing very close to the customer who usually comes to pick it up saving you from having to spend money on logistics; and there are benefits in terms of the business model. For example, we see it as a way of maintaining things like the retail photo environment and supporting the crafting market. I can also see it in specialised office print applications such as the printing of passes and cards. “On top of that, micro production concepts are taking things into areas that aren't in production today and encouraging people to produce at a really micro level. T-shirts is a very good example. We have a set of printers designed for T shirt printing, or direct to garment printing, and photo printing, which then moves into event printing. Within the last nine months we have launched our first double-sided mini lab printer. This is a desktopsized device that now does duplex printing so it's not just for printing holiday photos but can also be used for producing postcards, business cards and so on. These are not big innovations, but they do make a difference in terms of expanding potential uses of the product.” For the rest of this year, Epson’s main focus on the print side will be the AM-C series and upgrading large format printers that still use the previous generation of printhead to the latest PrecisionCore micro piezo printhead, bringing benefits in drop accuracy and single pass printing. Longer term, Ferguson says there is much more to look forward to from Epson. “Epson is a technology company and Epson’s investment in new technology is not slowing down. We're maintaining, if not growing, our revenues on a worldwide basis. We continue to invest significantly in R&D and in core technologies that fit our ethos, which is about being compact, highly precise, energy-saving and adding value to what people are doing domestically, in the office or in their industrial endeavours. I think the rate of technology development will actually increase over the next three to five years. You will see a lot more innovation coming from Epson.”
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