Asia Pacific looks at $6bn for managed print services

Revenues for managed print services and basic print services in the Asia/Pacific, excluding Japan, will exceed the US$6bn barrier by 2017, according to the International Data Corporation.

The IDC, a market intelligence company, says 2014 will mark a pivotal year for market expansion into broader customer segments as well as further market growth.

Jessie Lee, research manager for imaging, printing, and document solutions at IDC, says, “IDC sees fundamental transformation taking place in both vendor offerings and customer expectations in the MPS market,” said. Future success in the MPS market will come as a result of tapping into new opportunities by providing best in class services and expanding into sweet-spots across the enterprise to midmarket segment. In 2014, both quality (securing renewal and developing best practices) and penetration (channel programme and developing new logos) will have significant impact on the MPS market, based on the maturity of vendors and the country.”

IDC says a move away from hardware toward managed print services proves that vendors have taken advantage of the opportunity by offering multiyear business and customer cost savings and by strengthening the agility of the workspace with modern technology. It sees this strategy as critical for vendors to sustain customer value, provide differentiation, secure renewals, and generate best practices that will be symbolic references in similar customer clusters or vertical markets.

All of the major digital vendors have moved into managed print services as they look to diversify their businesses in an ever changing environment. IDC says that vendors will use managed print services to drive more transformative opportunities revolving around digital capture, workflows, cloud integration, and mobile printing enablement. IDC expects greater integration with IT services and business process outsourcing engagements and a growing focus on vertical and line-of-business solutions.

Researchers determine the demands of the future work environment by the maturity of the country and its vertical industries. IDC finds Australia to be the most mature market, over 30 per cent market share in Asia Pacific. It sees enterprise businesses with more than 1000 employees, and large businesses with 500-999 employees, as the initial segment to drive MPS adoption.

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