Way back in November of 2013, Konica Minolta announced at its national dealer meeting in Las Vegas that it was finalizing details on a partnership with 3D Systems that would get the company’s dealer channel selling and supporting 3D printers. And even though we’ve seen this coming for some time now, the official announcement that came in early June of 2014 still has the industry buzzing. Konica Minolta Business Solutions (KMBS), USA will be the first OEM to sell 3D printers in the US. What does this mean for the expansion of 3D printing and the future of the imaging industry?
While it is true that Konica Minolta is making history by being the first OEM to support 3D printers in the U.S. market, they aren’t the first OEM to get into 3D printing on a global scale. Back in 2010, HP partnered with Stratasys to sell a rebranded Stratasys printer in several European countries. Additionally, Canon Marketing in Japan has been a 3D Systems sales partner since late 2013 selling and supporting 3D systems products in Japan.
In fact, 3D Systems has been very aggressive in pursuing the expansion of its sales channels at a global level. The partnership with Konica Minolta is one of its most significant to date, and will arm both Konica Minolta dealers and its direct distribution network with 3D Systems’ complete product portfolio. 3D Systems currently has roughly 80 well-established resellers of its own in the United States, with this latest partnership set to expand that number significantly.
The Next Big Thing for the Imaging Industry?
Perhaps the biggest question on everyone’s minds is this: How well will Konica’s dealers be able to sell 3D printing solutions? And perhaps equally important, how well will 3D Systems be able to support much larger companies, such as Konica Minolta, who want to enter 3D printing through a partnership?
There’s no debating that the traditional imaging channel has a huge amount of interest in making the jump over to support 3D printing. But there’s also a lot of frustration coming from the early movers who haven’t yet seen what they believed would be a quick and easy return on investment. There are, however, a few technology resellers, specifically those with roots in traditional print, who are doing quite well with 3D. But in our estimation, the number of imaging dealers who currently are realizing significant revenue from 3D printing are in the minority compared to those that have been frustrated by their results thus far.
The one factor that most imaging dealers who are now selling 3D printing solutions successfully have in common is a sizeable investment of time. Sure, training or hiring sales staff takes some time. So does learning the ins, outs, and quirks of current 3D printing hardware. But the largest hurdle these companies have had to overcome is being able to understand the value that 3D printing can offer to current and future customer bases. It’s not simply enough for a couple of existing copier salesmen to go to manufacturer training seminars and then be expected to move a ton of hardware –it takes a deep understanding at a department-wide level.
A lot of this understanding comes with getting a better grasp of not just the output a printer is capable of, but what the end result for the customer can be with a broader understanding of the entire additive fabrication process. Grasping 3D modeling and design concepts can lead to a much better ability to communicate value to the customer. This is one area where the ‘ramp-up’ to proficiency is taking imaging dealers longer than expected.
Some of these resellers have achieved a level of overall 3D competency in six to eight months. For others, it has taken years.
Obviously, both Konica Minolta and 3D Systems are hoping they can cut down on the time it has typically taken imaging dealers to really start to realize return on investment in 3D. Achieving this synergy at an organizational level will be a challenge.
By comparison with Konica Minolta, 3D Systems is relatively immature in its corporate development. For example, 3D Systems’ 2013 annual revenues of $513 million are dwarfed by the billions of dollars that Konica’s Business Technologies segment, for which KMBS is part of, generate annually.
3D Systems has also struggled to some degree developing commitment to customer satisfaction over its tumultuous history. The frenzy of acquisitions the company has made in the past two years, and subsequent integration of so many of the elements into one cohesive business, present an interesting corporate culture that is still figuring out how all the moving pieces of many different business units work.
Therefore, it will be interesting to see how the relationship between the two companies develops. With everything else 3D Systems has going on right now, will it be able to effectively support such a huge influx of raw Konica Minolta sales power?
Predictions
Despite the challenges, Konica Minolta’s U.S. sales channel will likely start to see benefit from 3D printing solutions, as long as they can set realistic expectations from the beginning, and understand the key areas where others who are not native to 3D printing have failed.
At this time next year, my guess is that most dealers will still be grasping at the ‘low hanging fruit’ of selling 3D Systems’ color-capable binder jetting technology for use in product development applications. This technology, captured in the rebranded Zcorp products that 3D Systems purchased four years ago, seems to be the easiest additive fabrication process for the imaging industry to latch on to. It has broad appeal among existing imaging customer bases (educational institutions, architects, healthcare institutions, etc.) and is known for its generally reliable, consistent output –and of course the possibility for color.
Selling 3D printing as a solution for faster, more efficient product development is probably the most proven and established opportunity today –and it’s by no means a saturated market for these types of solutions. It is in these opportunities where the on-boarding process for these new Konica dealers will take place. Thinking like product developers can be a challenge, especially for a sales force entrenched in IT and imaging, but it’s a key to taking the 3D opportunity to the next level.
Finally, for across-the-board success, it’s not going to be all about Konica Minolta adapting. 3D Systems itself is going to have to use this partnership to learn how to manage a national network of very powerful and well organized sales teams, and in turn how to handle expectations from groups that are used to hardware with fifty years or more of engineering evolution built into it.
The partnership is a big step for both the 3D printing industry and the world of imaging. It represents an opportunity for rapid expansion in 3D printing adoption, as well as a new way to drive growth in the stagnating imaging industry. Both organizations have a lot riding on the deal, which will ultimately be used as a litmus test to see just how compatible 3D printing is with a broader audience.
This article was featured in Photizo Group’s Business Intelligence Service – an ongoing source of insight and original content in imaging, 3D printing, and related technology markets. For more insight, market research and analysis on the 3D printing industry, visit http://photizogroup.com/services/3d-printing.
