It was an eventful summer for Ricoh. It started off with the announcement that the company had acquired content services software specialist DocuWare, and continued with two new facilities opening on the east coast—including a new U.S. headquarters—that will update and modernize the company’s workspace.
Along the way, Ricoh won the Buyers Lab PaceSetter award for 2019-2020 under the category of Ease of Use: A4 Small Workgroup. Earlier in the year, the company rolled out its new RICOH IM C series of MFPs, as well as its much-anticipated Dynamic Workplace Intelligence approach (DWIa) and its Always Current Technology.
All of this is leading up to this month’s ConvergX19 dealer meetings in Las Vegas, with extensive feedback from dealer partners baked into the program. We spoke to Jim Coriddi, vice president, dealer division for Ricoh Americas, to learn more about the DocuWare acquisition, its digital workplace transformation strategy and what we can expect to see at the dealer meetings in Las Vegas. Coriddi also provides an overview of Ricoh’s 2019 campaign to date, and gives insight into what the manufacturer will be looking to accomplish in the new year.
Can you walk us through the genesis of the DocuWare deal and how it came about?
Coriddi: Ricoh’s aim, and global value proposition, is to ‘empower digital workplaces,’ wherever they may be, and this acquisition is fully aligned to that ambition. It is part of our strategy to invest and grow, organically and through acquisition, in the IT and digital services space. It is also fully aligned with our corporate strategy of bringing employees closer to their corporate offices by seamlessly connecting their workflows together.
What aspect of DocuWare’s value proposition appealed most to Ricoh?
Coriddi: While Ricoh already has extensive capabilities in the IT and Business Process Services spaces, bringing DocuWare’s capabilities into our portfolio means that we will now be able to offer our customers and Ricoh Family Group (RFG) dealer partners a market-leading solution to their workflow, processing and document management needs.
Additionally, this acquisition will significantly increase our opportunity to leverage the benefits of the Content Services Platform for Ricoh and its dealer partners. For example, the software can be integrated into our new Ricoh IM C series MFPs, which use our Ricoh Smart Integration platform to provide intelligent workflow processes in the office environment. We now have a full gamut of workflow services leveraging our Smart Integration platform and the DocuWare portfolio.
Without tipping your hand, what other types of acquisitions could advance Ricoh’s quest to further its digital workplace transformation strategy while aiding dealer growth?
Coriddi: Our global President and CEO, Jake Yamashita, has stated that Ricoh is committed to making strategic investments, organically and through acquisition, in the IT and digital services space with the objective of bringing the frontlines closer to their corporate offices by seamlessly connecting their workflows together. This is one of the many ways we provide valuable tools to RFG dealer partners to help them grow their business.
Recently, the company announced the opening of two new offices, including a new U.S. headquarters in Exton, Pennsylvania. Tell us a little about the strategy behind these moves.
Coriddi: This move is the culmination of a multi-year investment in empowering our digital workplaces across the U.S., and is part of a long-term strategy to update and modernize Ricoh offices across the U.S. Similar to how we’ve been helping our dealers and customers empower their digital workplaces to better serve their customers, the time is right to embrace change and further enhance employee collaboration within Ricoh’s own offices. The new facilities are equipped with Ricoh’s next-generation collaboration and productivity solutions, such as unified communications systems (UCS), intelligent multifunction printers (MFPs), interactive flat panel displays (IFPDs) and projectors.
How would you characterize the 2019 campaign thus far for Ricoh?
Coriddi: We talked to RFG dealer partners, and overall, our last fiscal year was a solid year. As you saw from Ricoh Company Ltd.’s first-quarter results, it too was a solid quarter and the U.S. played an important role in that. In 2019, Ricoh has continued to put innovation into practice to help our dealer partners and customers address their unique needs, and to consistently demonstrate that we are more than print. We empower digital workplaces by putting that information at our dealer partners’ and customers’ fingertips, and we help them understand what it means and how they can act on it to work smarter, driving improved productivity, increased efficiency and stronger customer satisfaction. For instance, RICOH Always Current Technology makes the latest productivity-enhancing applications available to users the instant they hit the market, so they can adjust their approach to meet evolving needs. We anticipate the successes we’ve seen from this approach to continue and evolve into 2020 and beyond.
Can you give us a sneak peek of what Ricoh has in store for its RFG dealer principles at ConvergX19 in November? What do you hope to accomplish in Las Vegas?
Coriddi: Ricoh’s ConvergX19 is different from previous events. We’re seeing tremendous change in the business environment. Based on those constant market changes, coupled with extensive surveys of our dealer community, ConvergX19 is being developed as a Leadership Partner Forum. The focus of the general session remarks, breakout sessions and Dealer Experience Center will be geared toward strategic discussions for dealer principals and their strategic decision makers. We’re collaborating for customer value, and the topics designed to drive these strategic discussions include workforce transformation, new annuity subscription-based business models, differentiating with integrated offerings (including production) and next-generation succession planning, to name a few. We are excited about the direction for this meeting and anticipate it will be beneficial to all RFG dealer principals. Stay tuned to learn more. It’s going to be a great event!
As we look ahead to 2020, what will Ricoh be seeking to accomplish?
Coriddi: In 2020, Ricoh will continue to invest in R&D and innovate to address organizations’ business challenges. This innovation will continue to demonstrate that Ricoh is about more than just print. We’ll continue to expand our industry-leading production line-up, including wide-format offerings. Connecting to the cloud with our IM Series platform, providing more customer value to help dealer partners with their own business efficiencies and sharing Ricoh’s vast resources with our RFG dealer partners are just a few examples. Taking place in November, ConvergX19 will be a perfect launching pad for RFG dealer partner activities in 2020. We are specifically focusing on topics that will help dealer principals make critical business decisions that will help them today and make them poised for growth in the future.
