At Canon’s recent European analyst event, the company discussed its roadmap for success across its workspace, production, and new business groups.
Amidst an uncertain economic climate and ongoing geopolitical concerns, Canon is committed to driving sustainable profit and growth. It remains focused on expanding and driving innovation across its product portfolio, stating, “We will be the undisputed driving force in business and imaging, enabling every business to achieve more.”
Canon highlighted its commitment to business growth and innovation, focusing on driving growth in its production printing business, expanding its digital transformation services portfolio and capturing new opportunities in new business areas.
Today, Canon has one of the broadest product hardware and software portfolios in the print sector, with a comprehensive offering across home, office, and production print. This includes the PIXMA, MAXIFY, and i-SENSYS products targeted at the home and small office; ImageRUNNER in the office; and imagePRESS, varioPRINT, ProStream, and ColorStream targeted at corporate mid-volume and high-volume production print.
Building differentiation around digital transformation
Canon has an established digital transformation services strategy, aimed at supporting customers in improving productivity and collaboration and strengthening information security through its Workspace Solutions offering. This encompasses traditional managed print services (MPS), leveraging cloud-enabled devices and integrating document and capture business process automation solutions.
Some key differentiators that Quocirca believes set Canon apart in particular are:
- Mature and integrated product portfolio for hybrid work. Due to a wide product offering across home and office, Canon’s portfolio is well suited to organisations of all sizes, particularly those that want a standardised and consistent product experience in the hybrid workplace. This is supported by integrated software offerings, which encompass both proprietary solutions such as uniFLOW, IRIS, and Therefore, and a range of third-party software products.
- Enhanced life cycle security approach. Beyond embedded device security features, Canon’s life cycle security services can help customers mitigate risk and vulnerabilities across their print and scan infrastructure. Services include an office health check at the pre-installation phase, a device hardening service at the installation phase, secure profile management at the operational stage, and data removal and other end of life services.
- Supporting in-house production printing with creative workspace solutions. Canon’s imagePRESS and iR ADV products enable businesses to bring entry-level production-quality capabilities in-house. This represents strong growth opportunities for Canon in areas such as direct mail, catalogues, and brochures.
- Predictive service innovation through analytics. Canon has a strong heritage in delivering smart remote services and fault diagnostics for its MPS customers. It has moved from a reactive to a preventative and predictive model, leveraging data analytics and AI. This is key to driving improved customer experience and increased operational efficiency for its customers.
- Driving product sustainability through remanufactured and certified used products. Canon has a strongly embedded circular material and component approach across its operations, which extends to its total product life cycle management strategy. Canon offers a remanufactured product range – imageRUNNER Advance ES Range, which provides a reuse ratio of 90% and the reassurance of Canon “as new” quality. Canon also offers Certified Used (CU) refurbished products.
Quocirca opinion
Canon is well positioned to grow momentum across its business. Its strong brand heritage and market leadership across both the print and imaging sectors is testament to continued product and technology innovation. Canon has shown a clear strategy to build further competitive advantage. In the home and office print sector, where products are increasingly commoditised, value creation will come from solutions and services – particularly in the areas of sustainability, security, and information management. Canon must deepen its channel engagement in these areas – potentially beyond its traditional partners – to capture new opportunities. This will accelerate its journey as a digital transformation services provider that moves beyond a primarily product (particularly hardware)-centric model.
