Xerox Blogs

Primed for 2010

Guest Blogger

- submitted by Gina Testa, vice president, Worldwide Graphic Communication Industry Business, Xerox Consolidation in the graphic communication industry is afoot once again – earlier this week Canon and Océ agreed to join forces. Given this economically challenging time it comes as no surprise. This competition drives innovation and operational efficiencies, and perhaps most importantly, it validates the strength of the production print market. So how will the Canon / Océ partnership compete with Xerox? There’s no doubt that the combined strengths of the two companies will make an expanded technology portfolio available to the market. But we know that print engines are only one piece of the puzzle for the graphic communications industry. Our focus is on not only the technology, but also on workflow and business development. We understand the need to concentrate on all three segments to drive page volume and revenue growth. It’s why our total value proposition is unmatched by our competition. We are primed for 2010. We have a solid global sales force in place with decades of production printing experience. We have a strong pipeline of new offerings that drive growth in the lucrative photo, packaging, high-end collateral, direct-mail and transpromo spaces. And, we will continue to provide reliable, consistent and experienced service support to our customers around the world. The rest of the market – even when they combine forces – is simply playing catch-up. - Gina Testa

Five Biggest Content Management Acquisitions of 2009

Francois Ragnet

Interesting slideshow on Fierce Content Management on the five biggest Content Management Acquisitions in 2009 (to date). You have read on my blog about OpenText and Vignette, Nuance and eCopy, Autonomy and Interwoven. EMC and Kazeon was not on my radar screen, but that is indeed a major one. The only one I am not sure about is Day Software selling MarketingNet to WAA (which I don't think I would consider top players). One that I would have considered for that shortlist was Kofax and 170 systems. Any other suggestions?

Projetos sustentáveis e produtos inteligentes para a redução do consumo de energia e preservação da biodiversidade

sergio.machado

A Xerox é uma empresa que tem um histórico de iniciativas voltadas para o meio ambiente, sendo a primeira empresa a introduzir o conceito de redução de consumo em seus produtos além de ser a pioneira na implementação da remanufatura durante a década de 90. Hoje, a Xerox continua inovando seu pioneirismo para preservar o meio ambiente com projetos sustentáveis que combatem os atuais desafios globais:

Alterações Climáticas e Energia
Preservação da biodiversidade e Florestas
Redução da emissão de produtos tóxicos e metais pesados
Gestão e Prevenção de Resíduos

Estas iniciativas sustentáveis fazem da Xerox o parceiro ideal para a sua empresa na consultoria de assuntos voltados a sustentabilidade e responsabilidade social que agregam valor ao seu negócio.

Produtos Inteligentes

Produtos Energy Star - Os produtos Xerox com Energy Star possibilitam 600,000 Ton. anualmente sem emissão de CO2 . Esta quantidade é o suficiente para iluminar 1.0 M de casas por ano. Multifucionais – As multifuncionais Xerox reduzem de 1422 kWh para 706 kWh o consumo de energia na sua utilização, em relação ao conjunto de equipamentos para a mesma função. (Redução de até 50%). Xerox Green Aliance - Através do nosso programa Green World Alliance, os clientes Xerox reciclam milhões de cartuchos por ano. As embalagens facilitam o uso e envio dos cartuchos para a Xerox onde são reciclados e mais de 90% do material é reutilizado ou reciclado. Para mais informações sobre sustemtabilidade e valor ecológico entre em contato com: rodrigo.palo@xerox.com

Projetos Sustentáveis

Na Xerox, a sustentabilidade é um meio de fazer negócios. Junto com nossos fornecedores, clientes e colaboradores, buscamos manter o mais alto padrão para a preservação do meio ambiente, protegendo e melhorando a saúde e a segurança de todos os membros das comunidades, dentro e fora da empresa. Redução do consumo de energia para proteção climática Nós reduzimos a emissão de carbono cortando o consumo de energia nas instalações Xerox e fornecemos produtos e soluções altamente eficientes a nossos clientes. Preservação da biodiversidade e das florestas do mundo inteiro Trabalhamos com parceiros no desenvolvimento de um ciclo de papel sustentável através do avanço nos padrões de gerenciamento de florestas e da oferta de produtos e serviços que reduzem a dependência do papel. Preservação do ar e da água Estamos comprometidos em eliminar o uso de materiais tóxicos e metais pesados em toda a nossa cadeia de suprimentos de produtos. Prevenção e gerenciamento de resíduos Os produtos da Xerox são desenvolvidos para utilizar os recursos com eficiência - minimizando os resíduos e reutilizando ou reciclando os materiais. Para maiores informações sobre projetos sustentáveis entre em contato com cristiana.lannes@xerox.com

Calculadora de Sustentabilidade

A Calculadora de Sustentabilidade emprega algoritmos e pesquisa na avaliação de documentos para proporcionar dados sobre a frota completa de produtos dos escritórios dentro de uma empresa, desde impressoras até dispositivos multifuncionais e copiadoras, independente de quem seja o fornecedor dos equipamentos. Depois da análise inicial que gera uma avaliação detalhada da sustentabilidade das suas operações, a Xerox se associa com os clientes para criar um ambiente de escritório que economize energia. Veja os resultados obtidos clicando nas imagens abaixo:

Para maiores informações sobre Calculadora de Sustentabilidade entre em contato com danielle.bori@xerox.com Fonte: Xerox Global Services

Cost cutting isn't just for losers anymore…

karenmcdermott

Record 2009 DOW, sinking dollar, continued market correction – what a day! Higher earnings for many companies are being attributed to cost cutting by some of the “talking heads” watching the market today. As a proof point, some of the companies leading the DOW didn’t even have international revenue to report. So what’s the deal? Restructuring. And there are two main areas impacted by restructuring: (1) Increasing commitment to technology to streamline operations and boost business processes and (2) reduction in force (lay-offs). There is a lot of talk about how companies have been restructuring as a result of the crisis of 2008/2009 and evidently that restructuring is paying off. Unfortunately, some of the restructuring is reflected in our 10% unemployment rate. I dream about a world where whether or not the market is up or down, companies take a holistic and consistent approach to managing costs and streamlining infrastructure and technology spend in an ongoing effort to ensure cost effective business process management. Not just when there’s a crisis or when the government is ordering a restructuring to determine whether or not a company should remain independent- just a business-as-usual approach. Well, the good news is that I am reading more and more about financial firms (in particular) maintaining their focus on their core business competencies and outsourcing “the rest” to those who can do it for them in a cost effective and more efficient way. There are so many areas within the business process where costs savings can be easily realized. I don’t expect a financial firm to be focusing on client account lifecycle management (for instance) – that’s why companies like Xerox spend a healthy amount of money on research and development every year to create technologies and solutions that address those areas and make them more efficient. Regardless of market ups and downs, technology and innovation rule the economy. Today’s competition isn’t just fueled by who has the most profitable customers, but by those who have the most efficient and cost effective focused organizations. One without the other cannot survive. There will likely be structural and cultural growth pains as a result of outsourcing technology and business processes– but it will be well worth it in the long run for our economy and the future of business.

HITECH bumps interim Privacy Rule fines cap to $1.5M

nancyrichardson

All expected more stringent fines and guidelines forthcoming. The interim Privacy Rule takes a huge stride from where it was a year ago from when it was capped at $25K. "HITECH Act strengthened the civil money penalty scheme by establishing tiered ranges of increasing minimum penalty amounts, with a maximum penalty of $1.5 million for all violations of an identical provision. A covered entity can no longer bar the imposition of a civil money penalty for an unknown violation unless it corrects the violation within 30 days of discovery." Rulemaking will be effective November 30th, open for public comments (www.regulations.gov) until December 29th. What are your thoughts? How will/can privacy breach risk be effectively mitigated before going broke?

Kicking and screaming

Guest Blogger

You know I got dragged to the blogging world kicking and screaming…I was doing radio news in the days when I had the UPI and AP teletype machines clacking by my ears and I still have boxes that say teletype ribbon.. (you don’t know what a teletype ribbon is….?)

Anyway I digress… I was one of those PR people who said, give me a story in a daily newspaper that reaches half a million and I’m happy. But this blogging world is pretty cool and allows me to – heaven forbid… be my own publisher.

So on Information Overload…just like many of you, I start my morning coffee at home before 7, checking work email, personal email, Facebook updates, text messages, Twitter and typing my son’s daily chore list before I head to work.

So forgive me that I didn’t have time to check the (hardcopy, printers ink on your fingers version) Columbus Day Wall Street Journal ‘til noon when I read the cover story of the Technology Section on Why Email No Longer Rules.. and what that means for the way we communicate

In the lead story Jessica Vascellaro writes about a shift from e-mail to social media and about how it is contributing to information overload.

She says that email is so old world and “Twitter, Facebook and countless others” are more today, always on.

I can buy that…you can get instant response from IM, you can find out if someone is even logged on or left a status update, you can share so many more experiences through photos and Youtube.

What does amaze me… the growth. She quotes a Nielsen number that says in August 2009, 277 million people used email, up 21% year over year, but social networking users had climbed 31% to 301 million users.

And because the old ways don’t go away…she leads right into the thoughts that float on this site…too much information.

With so much more information coming at you, how do you determine what is important?

I have seen first hand some of the Xerox research projects (on a trip to Grenoble, France, but that is another story) on how we will be able to sort, prioritize and do more with this stream of information. Jessica mentions filtering programs, some even available on Twitter today.

But I love her closing comment…”you can argue that because we have more ways to send more messages, we spend more time doing it.”

Amen.

- Bill McKee @xeroxprguy

Welcome to the new blogs.xerox.com

admin

We've made a few changes by now having individual blogs for our Xerox bloggers. Each blogger now has their own URL. Please take a look at our growing list of blogs at blogs.xerox.com.

What Comes After Cash for Clunkers?

Bettina Engelmann

It has been interesting to watch the Automotive industry and how they are dealing with the economy. Clearly “Cash for Clunkers” provided a big boost for car dealers in July and August. Although speaking with a friend who manages automotive lending for a large bank, she saw the majority of sales were the class 2 economy cars, and dealers were not moving a lot of high end cars or trucks with their associated higher profit margins. Luckily for them, the government did come through with the rebate checks. However, now business is down again and many dealers are depending on manufacturer’s cash back programs, and some even resorting to their own rebate programs. And what about brand loyalty? One example, my brother, a loyal customer for one of the larger automotive brands for the past two decades was going to trade in his clunker truck for a new vehicle of the same brand. However the dealer switched the agreement at the last second – so my brother went to a different dealer and ended up with a better deal, a similar vehicle, but a completely different brand. Is this really the way to reach the consumer? Is a “trade-in” or rebate marketing approach going to be effective long term and can this kind of approach be sustained? Innovative companies are taking advantage of cross-media communications, and carefully engineering all the touch points with their clients – from email to personalized web-sites to direct mail, and even personalized videos. They are not only effecting brand loyalty, but also opening new opportunities for after market sales and cross-selling. Please comment and share with us if you have any ideas around this and how you are taking advantage of your customer data to improve your business. Click here for a short video about our perspective on communication engineering.

Hanging with Ponch at the MBA

judsonphillips

While at the MBA's 95th Annual Convention & Expo, I was waiting in line to get my picture snapped with Erik Estrada (seemed like the thing to do) and I could not help but think how the mortgage industry has changed since Mr. Estrada appeared on CHiPs in the late 1970's as officer Francis "Ponch" Poncherello. For those too young, CHiPs was a TV series that followed the lives of two motorcycle police officers of the California Highway Patrol. Now, back to the mortgage industry. With the "mortgage meltdown" having been front and center of all major news outlets over the last year, the MBA took a new angle with its theme for this year, "Winning Strategies for the New Age." During the course of the past year, most people in the US have been exposed to terms, such as Negative Amortization (NegAm), loan modifications, Collateralized Debt Obligations (CDO), Mortgage Backed Securities (MBS), etc. However, think about where the industry was back in the days of CHiPs....

Savings and loans were the only institutions issuing residential mortgages
Interest rates for home loans were in double digits
Loan products consisted of a 30-year fixed rate mortgage
There was no private mortgage insurance (PMI) because at least 20% of the purchase price was typically required for a down payment
Securitization was in its infancy, having now grown from being non-existent in 1970 to a multi-trillion dollar industry today

Is it a contrast? Or, are times today becoming similar to the conditions in the 70's? In today's environment mortgage lenders are re-evaluating how to stay competitive. Mortgage lending has moved to a "flight to quality" with conforming loan products and most lenders are not offering the exotic loans of the past few years. Interest rates have remained historically low - even with the recent crisis - and homeownership has risen dramatically since Ponch cruised the California highways. Obviously, the technology used by mortgage lenders in the 70's would now be considered very archaic. At the show, mortgage technology was prevalent with systems for fraud, transparency, and electronic signature highlighted throughout the three day conference. Vendors and consultants offered, as stated by the conference prospectus, "strategic options to business challenges." At Xerox Mortgage Services, we offer a good strategic option for lenders. Our solution, BlitzDocs®, provides collaborative electronic loan folders and e-signature technology that enables lenders to streamline processes and be competitive. I am not a mortgage banker; I just help provide paperless and electronic signing technology to the industry. Let me know what you think...