Nowadays, with documents and office processes playing a key role in the functioning of businesses, the print industry faces many challenges related to efficiency, cyber security and technological evolution. Can print get smarter? What are the market trends and predictions for the print market? This is discussed in an interview with Dariusz Szwed, Product Specialist Team Leader at Canon Poland, who reveals the fascinating world of printing and digitalisation.
Brandsit: What are the biggest challenges in the current print market? How is Canon responding to them?
Dariusz Szwed, Canon: From the point of view of companies, the most important challenge is to make the whole process related to documentation and printing as supportive as possible in a way that does not absorb the employees in their daily tasks. Currently, the handling of documents and repetitive back office procedures in companies and institutions still involves massive human, hardware and financial resources. It consumes time that could be spent on substantive work, contact with clients and analysis of their needs, preparation of offers and projects, etc. In a nutshell: for the core activity that makes the company profitable.
The document workload – and after all, cost documents alone in many companies can run into hundreds or thousands per month – is a kind of hidden reserve. Unlocking these reserves, and consequently increasing the business efficiency of its customers, is seen by Canon as one of its key challenges and therefore a task for itself.
A very important route to this – and this is another important challenge, this time from a technological point of view – is digitisation and its marriage with companies’ printing processes. Digitalisation often involves migrating systems to the cloud, so that a company does not need to set up an IT network, maintain servers or employ skilled programmers. However, this is where another challenge arises: cyber security.
All of these challenges are reflected in the way we think about and design our offerings – from intelligent multifunctional print and scan devices, to uniFLOW, which is an integrated solution implemented in the company’s infrastructure for managing all print and scan jobs and devices, also available as a cloud-based variant of uniFlow online, to software for streamlining company processes – such as Therefore Online, which can be used in a cost-effective SaaS subscription model.
Brandsit: Canon identifies digitalisation as a key element in responding to these challenges, particularly in the context of migrating systems to the cloud. Can you describe what this digitalisation looks like in practice and how it affects cyber security?
Dariusz Szwed, Canon: The basis of the entire office ecosystem should be a modern multifunctional device that supports employees in their daily tasks, for which they should not spend too much time. Such a device must be compatible with cloud-based software through which we seamlessly connect with applications for processing and cataloguing documents in the relevant systems.
The foundation of the entire office ecosystem should be a modern multifunctional device that supports employees in their daily tasks, which they should not have to spend too much time on.
Canon’s portfolio of business solutions includes the imageRUNNER ADVANCE DX range – designed for effective hybrid working in environments where ongoing document handling needs to be fast, simple and fully secured at the hardware, network and user access levels.
Not to be outdone: the imageRUNNER ADVANCE DX C3800 offers a print speed of 35 pages/min and scans up to 270 A4 images/min. And combining this line of devices with uniFLOW Online software opens up advanced digital workflow possibilities. Machine learning allows preferred scanning or printing options to be memorised, meaning invaluable savings in staff time for repetitive tasks.
All of these functions, properly configured and managed, increase the efficiency of front- and back-office staff and shift their competence priorities from typically clerical tasks towards advisory, analytical and relationship-oriented activities.
The market is evolving towards digital transformation and the imageRUNNER ADVANCE DX line is one of our responses to these changes.
Brandsit: What does the future of print look like? What trends can be expected in the coming years?
Dariusz Szwed, Canon: Above all, the future of printing is intelligent process automation. This ranges from increasingly efficient printing and scanning solutions via cloud-based cataloguing and archiving software, to advanced security systems on multiple levels.
One of the dominant trends in the next few years will be ‘bespoke’ systems to improve operational efficiency, reduce costs and ease the burden on staff. It is also important to adapt devices and software to new developments in the labour market, such as remote or hybrid working, where some staff work in different locations outside the physical office of the company. When we look at the different solutions offered by Canon and the directions they are taking in terms of technology, we see all these trends very well.
Brandsit: What are the benefits and challenges of digitalisation in the print industry? Canon aims to create devices that support employees in everyday tasks that they shouldn’t have to spend too much time on. Can you elaborate on how this idea is being realised within the Canon portfolio?
Dariusz Szwed, Canon: The catalogue of benefits is huge, and which ones come to the fore depends partly on the industry. In banking, for example, front office staff are now not only involved in handling and selling financial products or processing transactions, but also in printing forms, scanning or cataloguing documents. By implementing modern hybrid document solutions, many of these routine duties disappear and employees can focus on consulting, analytical work or solving unusual situations that are difficult to process digitally. This is a huge benefit from the institution’s point of view.
How do we achieve this? For example, OCR, or Optical Character Recognition, allows documents to be automatically classified and data extracted when a document is scanned into digital form. Tasks such as file naming, storage location selection, authentication using external credentials and fast scanning of document packages are functions that directly translate into employee productivity and time savings, and reduce the potential for human errors.
The Archiving Assistant function available in the uniFLOW Online solution can automatically classify and organise scanned documents by assigning them to predefined categories. Data about the scans, such as document type or company name, is extracted at the digitisation stage and used to automatically name and save the files in the appropriate location in the cloud. What’s more, the software can learn to recognise typical, repetitive documents so that next time their classification can already take place fully automatically.
The extracted data can then be fed directly into the document management software – so employees spend less time on tedious manual data entry and transcription of content, while at the same time there are fewer errors thanks to the identification of incorrect or incomplete data at the document reading stage.
Brandsit: Canon makes a strong case for the importance of cyber security in print. What are the main information security challenges Canon sees in the print industry?
Dariusz Szwed, Canon: I would start by saying that the most sensitive information must be protected at every stage of the process and document lifecycle – also before it is digitised. Translating this into the language of office practice, this includes protecting against unauthorised access to the device and to documents that are, for example, queued for printing. For example, user authentication on the device’s touchscreen ensures that no one other than an authorised person can pick up a printout without confirming their identity, and audible and visual alerts on left-over originals warn when a document containing confidential information is left on the device.
Another layer is digital security, a challenge that is undoubtedly serious these days. This is why, for example, the imageRUNNER ADVANCE DX C3800 devices are protected against various types of cyber attacks. The system is checked every time the device is started up, protecting against software tampering and blocking unauthorised programmes. The standard version of the device is already equipped with a number of features to limit attacks and the leakage of sensitive data: data encryption on the disks, SMB 3.0 file server, TPM 2.0 module or functions for formatting disks and removing hidden data residues after each job.
The biggest challenge in cyber security always remains the human factor, as both hackers and data protection specialists have been well aware for years.
While we are on the subject of cyber security, it is also worth mentioning that moving services to the cloud – here our Therefore Online document management software can serve as an illustration – not only relieves the company of the need to have its own server room and build a company IT network from scratch, but is also a much more secure option. The software is then kept up to date by a specialised team and, in addition, such systems are subject to security audits by external companies at least once a year.
The biggest challenge in cyber security always remains the human factor, as hackers and data protection specialists alike have been well aware for years. That’s why Canon designs its devices and solutions so that the room for human error is minimised as much as possible.
Brandsit: What are the anticipated developments in print technology and how does Canon intend to participate in them?
Dariusz Szwed, Canon: Looking strategically at a company’s printing and workflow processes – technology is evolving in this direction to eliminate everything that is manual, repetitive and labour-intensive.
In an apparent counter to the increasing sophistication of technology, once we get down to the level of the direct relationship between it and the human being, there is a need to simplify the very operation of the multifunctional device, software or system in question – so that employees do not have to ‘doctor’ it. The direction of development in this case is therefore towards intuitiveness, friendliness and stress-freeness at the interface between technology and humans. I will use Therefore Online again as an example – it is a low-code tool, which means that the implementation of further system processes does not require programming skills, can be implemented at low cost and without involving additional staff.
Looking at the issue from yet another level, there is no doubt that printing is evolving towards solutions that are increasingly efficient, fast, energy and material efficient, which is important not only from an efficiency point of view but also from an ecological one. Canon is a committed participant in all these trends, illustrated by the specific examples I mentioned earlier, which are our direct response to the needs of the market and our customers.
