Exhibit 2.34
In Part I of our Survey in the October issue, production print was cited by 45% of dealers as a growth opportunity, although only 12% identified it as their No. 1 growth opportunity, a 3% decrease from last year. As we noted in the production print portion of the Survey in October, we do not consider light production as production print when specifying the manufacturers that dealers identify as their top production print suppliers.
Because of this, we do not include Sharp or Toshiba, two companies that currently do not offer production print products although Sharp will be coming to market with its first production print machines in early 2024. As a result, five companies make the cut in Exhibit 2.34—Canon, Konica Minolta, Kyocera, Ricoh, and Xerox. Only four of those carry full production print lines—Canon, Konica Minolta, Ricoh, and Xerox. Collectively, these companies received recognition from 194 of 201 dealers who voted in this category who said these manufacturers were the best. The “other” category in Exhibit 2.26 includes Epson, HP, and RISO.
Production Print Manufacturer Ratings
Ricoh ranked in the No. 1 position among production print manufacturers with 34%, ahead of Canon (23%), Konica Minolta (20%), Xerox (15%), and Kyocera (5%). Only 3% of the dealers selected Epson, HP, or Ricoh in the “other” category as the top production print provider.
As one would expect, the majority of dealers who selected the Best Production Print Manufacturer voted for their primary A3 provider. Leading the way were Kyocera and Xerox dealers with 100% of their votes going to their primary A3 provider. They were followed by Ricoh (82%), Canon (64%), and Konica Minolta (54%).
Because of their extensive production print lines, we believe Canon, Konica Minolta, and Ricoh will continue to dominate in this category in future Surveys. Xerox also has an extensive production print offering, however, there are not enough Xerox dealers participating in our Survey to raise Xerox’s production print profile in our Survey. Even though we saw an increase in the number of Canon and Konica Minolta dealers participating in our Survey this year, there still aren’t enough participating to compete with Ricoh and supplant them as the top production print manufacturer. Consider that Ricoh had 96 dealers participating in this year’s Survey, more than the combined number of dealers from Canon and Konica Minolta (84).
