IPG recently visited Canon's impressive 18,000-square-foot Customer Experience Center, in Boca Raton, Fla. for a tour of the facility and a peek at Canon's new monochrome mid-production digital press, the Océ VarioPrint DP 135.
Dennis Amorosano
More features. Better finishing options. Lower cost. Manufacturers of black-and-white copiers see these trends and more. by Mike Llewellyn Last year, Drew Bilotta, director of Lockheed Martin Management and Data Systems, oversaw the installation of 150 black-and-white Konica copiers, mostly 7020s and 7030s. "At the end of the day, everything comes down to cost, and that's where they [Konica] had a significant advantage," says Bilotta. He explains that he was able to use a company-wide contract with Konica to leverage the best price. But while keeping costs down is certainly important to copier manufacturers, this is not their only strategy. Their black-and-white copiers
With digital technology growing, will there still be a demand for analog black-and-white copiers in the future? It depends on whom you ask. • Dennis Amorosano, Canon: "Surprisingly, there is a demand for analog machines. Much of the demand is due to price. The cost of analog is significantly less. A lot of customers don't have applications that justify digital, Internet-capable machines. For black-and-white copying only, you don't need to buy into digital. Analog will be around for all of these reasons, but mainly the due to the price." • Steve Pearl, Minolta: "There's still a demand for analog black-and-white because some businesses need