Canon hopes to capture half of printer market

BANGKOK (JP): Canon will introduce four new premium "bubble jet" printer products in Indonesia at the end of this month. Its target is to control half of the printer market in the country this year, according to Merry Harun, Canon division manager at PT Datascrip, the distributor of Canon printers in Indonesia.

Merry said the four new models would help strengthen Canon's position, particularly in the office sector, the most lucrative part of the printer market.

"We are aiming to control around 50 percent of the (printer) market this year," Merry told reporters during a press tour to Thailand.

She said that according to Dataquest, Canon dominated 40 percent of the domestic printer market in 1999, selling around 80,000 inkjet printers.

The second position was held by Hewlett-Packard with less than 30 percent share, and third was Epson with nearly 25 percent share.

Merry said that the bulk of the sales volume this year would still come from Canon's cheaper super printer series called the BJC265 SP and the BJC 2000 SP.

She said that the two products were especially designed for household computer users particularly in crisis-hit economies like Indonesia.

Canon's four new printer models include the BJC-85 mobile printer, BJC-8200 ultra photographic printer, BJC-6500 A3 business printer, and the BJC 8500 A3 wide format printer.

The new mobile printer model has a 2-in-1 printer feature which combines printing and scanning functions.

The portable model is also lighter, faster and allows wireless printing: no need to connect with personal computer or notebook.

In Indonesia, the new product will be sold at Rp 1.9 million (US$253) per unit.

The BJC-8200 printer is claimed to be the number one photographic quality printer because it uses Canon's latest microfine droplet technology for high resolution, low graininess, multi-gradation and image stability.

Canon aims to sell the model to frequent individual users of digital cameras, and business users such as design offices, advertising production companies, architect offices, and printing businesses.

The new product will be sold at Rp 3 million per unit in Indonesia.

The BJC-6500 model provides excellent quality and the fastest printing speed for documents up to A3 size.

The model is also claimed to be the most cost effective because of its separate ink tanks system, allowing empty tanks of a particular color to be replaced without changing tanks that still have ink.

The model is to be launched at Rp 3.5 million each.

The BJC-8500 model is equipped with water resistant technology and promises superior printing quality on plain paper. The product will be sold at Rp 13 million each.

Merry said that Datascrip planned to boost Canon's after sales service centers throughout Indonesia as part of the strategy to maintain its leadership in the domestic printer market.

She said that now there were around 20 after sales service centers.

Datascrip, a distributor of various office equipment was established 31 years ago by local entrepreneur Joe Kamdani. It started marketing Canon's printer products in 1980.

Merry declined to disclose the sales revenue of Datascrip last year, but said that around half of it came from selling Canon's printer products.

Meanwhile, Matt Ishii of Canon Singapore Pte. Ltd. said that Canon would double its promotional budget this year to between US$ 6 million and US$ 8 million amid tight competition in printer markets worldwide.

He said that worldwide, Canon expected to sell around 1 million units of bubble jet printers per month this year. Last year Cannon managed to sell around 7 million units, mostly to the American and European markets.

Ishii said that Canon's Asia/Oceania sales were expected to grow by more than 16 percent this year from around 1.96 million units sold in 1999.

He said that sales in the crisis-hit Asian countries would largely come from Canon's low-cost printer products.

Canon's low-cost printer products are manufactured by Canon High-Tech Ltd. in Thailand where copiers and facsimile products are also manufactured.

The Thailand unit, 100 percent owned by Japan's Canon Inc., started operation in 1992.

Canon High-Tech vice president Mikio Hasegawa said that the company expected to produce some 7.42 million units of low-cost bubble jet printers this year from around 7 million units last year.

"The market for bubble jet printers is growing dramatically," he said. (rei)