SCANNING: A GATEWAY TO DIGITALISATION
latest scanning technology can be harnessed to streamline processes and increase capabilities in the ever-changing business landscape. Iwona Sikora, Iron Mountain’s senior vice president and general manager, Records Management for Europe & South Africa, adds that customers seek to digitise their content so that they can better leverage their existing data. “The best way to achieve this is to ensure a quality picture, and so we see this as a driving requirement for scanning solutions across the board,” she says. “What this means is that organisations have quicker and more effective access to their documentation/data, in turn improving their ability to process and get it to the right person at the right time.”
Role for MFPs However, Joseph Odore, global and US&C portfolio marketing manager at Kodak Alaris, notes that a business’ scanning needs will determine what product they require. “If your paper and your digitisation needs are small – say a couple of hundred pages a day, you’re probably fine with an MFP,” he says. “The need for a dedicated scanner is either volume- or process-based. “For example, if you’re in accounts and receiving paper invoices and cheques and you’re scanning those for the records and ensuring there’s an invoice tied to it. You receive a lot of those documents daily, then that might require a dedicated scanner to ensure those documents are being put into the correct workflows and processes. “Likewise with digital conversion, if your information processes include paper, then you will need some kind of scanning device to do that. Your volumes will dictate the hardware in which you’re going to associate those processes with. If you’re an insurance agency, let’s say there’s a tonne of paper to work with there, so they’re going to need a scanner somewhere, or people remotely with scanners or maybe remotely with MFPs.” Future growth That said, the market for scanners is growing, and likely to continue to, and can be a good source of revenue in certain sectors. “Document scanning has been widely used for some time to digitise paper-based records and for many partners – especially those in vertical markets such as legal and healthcare – it can be a very good source of business,” says Peter Lunn, senior category manager, print and supplies, UK, TD SYNNEX.
Iwona Sikora SVP and general manager Iron Mountain
ironmountain.com
Understanding customer needs With this range of customer needs for their
scanner, Iwona says that resellers should seek to understand what the buyer want to achieve by digitising their content. “What are their long-term strategic objectives, and how does this program of digitisation fit into them?,” she says. “[For instance] are they a healthcare organisation looking to clean up their physical archive and speed up file retrieval of patient records? Are they a public sector organisation looking to digitise legacy documents, often more than 100 years old, to extract as much value as they can to shape future government policy? Understanding customer need is the key to upselling software,
Joseph Odore global and US&C portfolio marketing manager Kodak Alaris
consumables, service packages, etc. “As businesses look at transforming
mountains of paper records as part of their digital transformation strategy, scanners will remain a critical part of this process. Creating an efficient, streamlined and reliable transformation programme starts with the use of industry grade equipment, and organisations need to ensure that their scanners are up to the task required of them.”
kodakalaris.com
“Yes, absolutely, you do need to have a dedicated scanner if you want to digitise
documents to a high standard and/or in volume. Modern document scanners are fast, reliable and extremely versatile, and also very energy efficient. “The advances we have been in scanning technology and optical character recognition, the growing desire to capture and make use of data and growing trust in cloud-based services and storage, have all contributed to making document scanning more popular and it will continue to present a good opportunity to partners.” Jarek adds that healthy growth in the scanner market is predicted for the next few years. “This is not a hype of today and tomorrow everyone will forget,” he says. “This is a process, and it will last another good few years. This is the time to be close to it and to better understand the market.”
Peter Lunn senior category manager, print and supplies, UK TD SYNNEX
uk.tdsynnex.com
printinthechannel.co.uk
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