Fall in profit for Xerox

Xerox had the following results in the 4th quarter of 2008:

* Q4 net income $1 million; revenue falls 10%
* Sales of supplies and services down 8%
* Sales to high growth markets retreated

According to Reuters, Xerox barely eked out a profit in the fourth quarter, hurt by a dramatic decline in demand from Russia and other emerging markets, and $349 million in restructuring costs, sending shares down 9 percent.

The lingering sting of higher manufacturing costs, due to the strong Japanese yen, also caused the manufacturer of digital printers and provider of document management services to forecast a first-quarter profit that fell short of analysts' targets.

Xerox saw a startling 14 percent decline in revenue from high-growth regions, after these developing markets delivered 17 percent revenue growth through the first three quarters of 2008. Xerox cited soft currency exchange rates and the rapid weakening of Russian and eastern European economies.

"Where you really saw the weakness was in the developing markets," Cross said. "Some of these areas, whether its Brazil, Argentina or Russia, were really on fire. Multinational companies are going to have a challenge dealing with currency this quarter and going into 2009."

Xerox said fourth-quarter net income was $1 million, or nil per share. That is down from $382 million, or 41 cents a share, a year earlier.

In 2008, Xerox announced a restructuring plan, including about 3,000 job cuts, aimed at saving $200 million in 2009. In the fourth quarter, restructuring charges were 27 cents a share. Revenue fell 10 percent to $4.37 billion. Revenue from sales of supplies and services -- known as "post-sale" revenue -- fell 8 percent to $3.1 billion. Equipment sale revenue declined 15 percent to $1.3 billion, reflecting "weakened economic conditions around the world," Xerox said.

Source: Reuters

Key words: Xerox, profit, 2008, Russia

Rap about how costly inks are!

The Printer Ink Rip Off - Rap Song @ Yahoo! Video

A laser cartridge remanufactured 25 times!

The U.K. magazine The Recycler informed that a local company was able to recycle a laser cartridge for 25 times. The Hewlett Packard mono-laser printer cartridge, owned by The Book Depository located in Gloucester, printed more than a quarter of a million pages. By remanufacturing the cartridge 25 times, The Book Depository has saved £972.50 (EUR1033) at today’s prices, and prevented 27.5 kilos of waste being sent to landfill, where printer cartridges can take 450 years to decompose. It has also saved 64.5kg of CO2 from being emitted into the atmosphere.

Source: www.therecycler.com

Cartridge costs are on the rise in North America

Almost all of the printer manufacturers increased their prices for printing supplies. According to the web portal Printer.com, there have been several increases registered at the U.S. market lately.

As of September 1, 2008, HP increased the list prices on all Mono and Color LaserJet Print Cartridges by 5%, as well as increasing by approximately 5-6% the list prices on inkjet cartridges and print heads. The company says this was done as part of HP's portfolio management.

As of November 3rd, 2008, Lexmark made an across the board 5% price increase on printer supplies, while Xerox raised the price on selected products from 3% to 6%. But also Brother, Canon, and Oki are increasing printer supplies prices. Oki has said that prices of ink and toner cartridges are going up a flat 5%, but Brother and Canon have not stated a rate of increase yet.

Although consumers will likely not feel a significant impact from this price increase, small and large businesses with tens, or even hundreds, of printers will see a significant rise in their cost of printing.

Printer manufacturers also significantly increased their prices of printer cartridges in Europe in the last few months. New questions are expected in the European Commission in reaction to cartridge price increases.

Source: www.printer.com

Key words: market, prices for supplies, cartridges

How much does HP chief Hurd get paid in 2008?

It is not ethical to count other people’ money, but mass media allows us to have a glance at this forbidden territory.

Under three years of Mark Hurd's leadership, Hewlett-Packard Co. has added more than $30 billion in sales, seen its profit more than triple, and for that "exceptional and sustained" performance Hurd was rewarded with a $34 million pay package in the latest fiscal year.

Hurd joined HP in 2005 to engineer a major turnaround after the rocky reign of former CEO Carly Fiorina, has answered by aggressively cutting costs and positioning the company as a bigger challenger to IBM Corp. through the $13.9 billion acquisition of technology services provider Electronic Data Systems.

At the end of 2005, HP had sales of $86.7 billion and profit of $2.4 billion.

When the company's current round of job cuts is complete — HP is slashing 24,600 positions, nearly 8 percent of its 320,000 workers — Hurd will have cut nearly 40,000 jobs in two big rounds of layoffs since he took the job. Under Hurd's watch, HP has also regained its title of world's biggest personal computer manufacturer from Dell Inc., though Dell has been stealing some of that ground back with a new retail strategy.

Now HP faces hard times as consumers spend much less. Despite it, Hurd was rewarded in 2008 for steering the company to "exceptional and sustained" financial performance in his first three full years on the job.

Hurd pulled down $23.9 million in performance-based cash bonuses in 2008, according to the filing, which was almost twice as much as the $13.3 million in cash bonuses he snagged in 2007.

Hurd, 52, was also rewarded with $7.9 million worth of stock-based compensation during the period, nearly $3 million less than in 2007.

Hurd's compensation package also included more than $738,000 worth of additional compensation for things like: home security ($256,000), personal use of HP's corporate jet ($135,734) and a $71,000 mortgage subsidy Hurd is guaranteed for relocation expenses under his employment agreement.

Hurd's salary of $1.45 million increased only slightly over 2007.

Source: Google.News

Key words: Mark Hurd, HP, salary

Epson continues to enforce its cartridge patents in the USA

After Epson reached its goal of stopping ink cartridges infringing on the company’s patents from entering the U.S. back in October 2007, the company is now determined to enforce its patents all over the country.

Epson informed it would vigorously proceed with enforcement of its patents now that the validity and enforceability of its patents have again been ratified. A second ITC trial was conducted on Jan.14-16, 2009 in Washington D.C. to determine any financial penalties that may be assessed against Ninestar, Mipo America, Ltd. and Cana-Pacific Ribbons Inc. and their affiliates for alleged violations of the General Exclusion Order. The ITC has not yet determined any violations, but has the authority to assess substantial penalties up to $100,000 per day of violations or twice the commercial value of infringing imports.

In addition to the ITC actions, Epson filed U.S. District Court lawsuits in Portland, Ore., for patent infringement damages against the same 24 companies named in the ITC action and numerous additional distributors and retailers alleged to have continued infringements after the ITC Final Determination.

By these Epson shows it is really determined to use its advantage (court decisions) to the full on the territory of the U.S.

Source: www.epson.co.jp

Key words: Epson, court, cartridges, remanufacturing

What do people think about color printing?

Zogby Survey lead a survey about users' opinion on color printing. The stats come below:

-More than half of the 2,100 respondents (53%) said they think printing in color is a luxury.

-More than one third of respondents said the expense (35%) is the main reason they did not print more in color, and four out of five (82%) said they would be somewhat or very likely to print in color if it cost the same as black and white.

-Two in five respondents (39%) did not recognize the ROI value of printing in color – they strongly or somewhat disagreed that they spend time thinking about the places in their documents where color would give them more of a ROI.

-About one-quarter of respondents said they most frequently print presentations/ PowerPoint documents (28%) or those with graphs (25%) in color.

The Reality of Color’s ROI:

-Color helps sell up to 80 percent more. Collateral materials, sales brochures and other consumer communications can help generate more sales with the application of color. (Source: Green, Ronald E., "The Persuasive Properties of Color", Marketing Communications, and Modern Office Procedures, "Grasp Facts Fast with Color”)

-Color increases readers’ attention spans and recall by 82 percent. Safety notices, product guides and marketing collateral are more likely to be read and leave a lasting impression if they’re in color. (Source: White, Jan V., Color for Impact, Strathmoor Press, April, 1997)

Source: Xerox Corp

Key words: color printing, users