THE DOCUMENT COMPANY XEROX LOOKS TO A COLORFUL FUTURE
Published:05-November-1997
By Computergram
Rank Xerox is dead, long live The Document Company Xerox. Or so the
re-christened UK arm of the mighty Xerox Corp would have us
believe. As of November 1 this year, the new Xerox (UK) Ltd
commenced commercial activities, following the sale by Rank Group
Plc of its remaining 20% interest in the former European joint
venture which was Rank Xerox. Calling itself "The Document Company
Xerox", the rebirth is meant to represent a new and exciting era
for the UK outfit, which has existing revenue in excess of $1bn and
over 7,000 employees. "The passing of the name Rank Xerox marks the
end of an institution that had become as well known and trusted as
Marks & Spencer and British Airways," said the UK's managing
director, Bill Goode. But Goode wants the whole photocopier legacy,
which the name invariably conjures up, to be sloughed off in favor
of a more holistic approach to the business of digital document
management. "The Xerox name means we help people and organizations
create documents and use documents," he said. And so the news at
Xerox is all about digital and color. The new Xerox products will
all be digital and networkable, while revenues from color printing
and copying grew by 50% over the 1996 third quarter. Xerox claims
to have created the monochrome print on demand market and now it
plans to do the same for the color printing market. It will also be
throwing its full weight into the small office and home user
market, where the growth is highest, with its new indirect sales
division, the Xerox Channels Group. And don't get carried away with
the Xerox Vs. Hewlett-Packard Co scenario. This isn't just a two
horse race, according to Xerox. The market is so huge that it's a
very open field of play. But it was left to Bob Anderson, the
director Xerox's European research laboratories, to talk about the
other great legacy of Xerox's past, that of creating spectacular
inventions of original brilliance, and then dropping them on the
floor to be forgotten while other people steal them away to
commercialize. Well that's all in the past too, says Anderson. All
research from now on will be putting the customer first. "Our
customers don't care about technology", he said "they just care
about getting things done." Novel technology prototypes will be
built up around real document flow processes and tested in "safe"
customer environments. Recent innovations cited include the six
million pixel, high resolution flat display and the high speed
(1,000 page per minute) flat document scanner. Xerox wants to be
your one stop shop for all things document orientated, even to the
extent of providing consultancy services to re-engineer your
business processes. And to this end, it says, service and
consultancy revenues will eventually become the Company's biggest
income stream. According to Xerox UK's director of business
services John Drinkwater, "By the year 2000, The Document Company
Xerox, the company you used to think was the copier company will
have moved through being a digital and color products company to
being one whose lead offering is services."
