COVER STORY
PRINTER MARKET
“WHILE A4 PRINTERS ARE FINDING MAJOR TRACTION ACROSS HOMES, SOHOS, SMBS AND ENTERPRISES, ‘A3’ PRINTERS FIND PRIME DEPLOYMENT WITH ARCHITECTURE, ENGINEERING, CONSTRUCTION, RETAIL AND OTHER SPECIALIZED VERTICAL BUSINESSES.” NITIN HIRANANDANI, DIRECTOR (PRINTING SYSTEMS), PPS, HP INDIA
The Market Currently, as per the IDC reports (says Kyocera), the ratio of A4:A3 is 10: 1, respectively. Approx 1 lakh A3 machines are sold in India every year as compared to 10 lakh A4 (including low cost inkjets). “The A4 market is almost 10 times the size of the A3 market,” says K Swethanarayan. The percentage of A3 printer required in an office environment is roughly less than 10%, so the 90% of the printing is going to be on A4 format. So if an A4 product can address certain concerns like ink cost, network connectivity, want to connect with wifi on the personal devices, cloud printing and if traditional A3 maybe lacking all those features, then the shift towards the A4 can happen informs Ram Prasad. In the growing multi-function printer market in India, the A4 MFPs dominate compared to the A3 owing to its superb functionality says Madan. Companies have been focusing more on A4 MFPs driven by the need of people moving towards scanning and printing original documents, which can be scaled to fit the paper size available. “This is resulting in the decreasing need for A3 output.
Also, in general, A3 centric copiers occupy more office space where as an A4 device needs lesser space.” He further informs that A3 size laser MFP share is 18% approx. and rest 82% is dominated by A4 size printers. K Swethanarayan adds that the trend is moving towards A4 printers that can print A3 on demand as the typical office environment is 90% A4 with 10% A3 prints. However, in India the change is slow as the basic B to C conversions show that the transformation of the market takes several years to take shape. “If you look even two years back some of the high-end features in terms of speed, connectivity etc. were on some of the high-end A3 machines but now more and more vendors are offering these kinds of features in A4 MFPs,” remarks Ram Prasad. When it comes to opting between the two the industry opines that it depends solely on the work load and output requirements. Both categories of A3 and A4 enjoy their own target customers. Depending on the usage requirements the main
“A4 MACHINES ARE CHEAPER TO BUY BUT HAVE HIGHER RUNNING COSTS. A3 MACHINES ARE MORE EXPENSIVE BUT HAVE EXTREMELY LOW RUNNING COSTS.” K SWETHANARAYAN , MD , KYOCERA DOCUMENT SOLUTIONS
“IF YOU LOOK EVEN TWO YEARS BACK SOME OF THE HIGHEND FEATURES IN TERMS OF SPEED, CONNECTIVITY ETC. WERE ON SOME OF THE HIGH-END A3 MACHINES BUT NOW MORE AND MORE VENDORS ARE OFFERING THESE KINDS OF FEATURES IN A4 MFPS.” RAM PRASAD, DGM (CONSUMER PRODUCTS GROUP), EPSON INDIA
customers of A3 printers are architects, consultants etc., while A4 printers are normally bought by any government segments, SOHO, SMB or even Home. K Swethanarayan says that heavy users should look at the A3 option as the running costs become more important than the acquisition cost. Madan adds that A4 printers are suitable for those who have the requirements of printing paper every day, and would benefit from reduced printing costs. On the other hand, A3 printers are more suitable for those organisations that regularly require printing in A3 sizes and have abundant space to fit in the huge A3 printers. Nitin Hiranandani, Director, Printing Systems, PPS, HP India, “While A4 printers are finding
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