Businesses are continuously innovating to streamline costs, manage expenses and trying to offer original products and services that differentiate it from competitors.

However, this is often easier said than done and organisations find it challenging when faced with cumbersome internal processes, such as document management and print services.

With printing costs account for 1% to 3% of the company’s revenue and when 23% of helpdesk calls are attributed to printer related issues, it is hardly surprising that organisations consider printing expenditure to be a necessarily evil and do not always question how these costs can be reduced.

After the recent recession, many companies have spent much of their budgets on keeping the lights on leaving little room for innovation and new business approaches. With the pace which technology is evolving there has been a paradigm shift towards adopting new approaches in order to reduce operational costs and to streamline processes for efficiency and quicker return on investment.

This leaves more time and money to focus on business innovation and increasing revenue.

Managed print services (MPS) is a value proposition which helps the customer improve the way that documents and information are managed and shared, allowing businesses to adopt new operational methodologies in order to drastically reduce printing costs and increase business productivity.

Samsung Electronics South Africa believes that it is of utmost importance to understand the specific challenges faced by a business in order to recommend customised solutions.

Mike van Lier, Business Enterprise Leader, at Samsung Electronics, SA explains, “Samsung takes the time to do a detailed analysis of the current print, scan, copy and fax systems in use versus the overall business need. This data is then used to identify a tailored printing solution best suited to the unique requirements of the organisation.

“Our MPS offering is fully comprehensive to assist businesses in streamlining their printing infrastructure, while saving time and providing a footing for future savings.”

For document intensive organisations, Samsung offers a national footprint with full technical support and its “next business day on-site” service ensures that the focus remains on the company’s strategy rather than technical maintenance.

Samsung’s MPS includes services such as print assessment and consulting, change management, carbon footprint balancing, device asset management, on-site support, help desk, hardware and software installation, maintenance contracts and statistical usage reports.

“We understand that most SME’s do not have the luxury of an in-house CIO and those that do have IT resources tend to have them within a limited capacity. The Samsung MPS Programme is designed to compensate for this by substantially optimising printing resources and relieve IT departments of service and support responsibilities,” says Van Lier.

Understandably, not many organisations have the luxury of allocating a significant capital outlay on new systems, making it important for an MPS programme to offer a leasing programme so that any implementation is practical, beneficial and within budget.

This means that that there is no need for a costly cash outlay and systems can easily be upgraded or replaced as technology evolves and newer more innovative printers becoming available.

“Managing print services have become a mission-critical element of business operations today. Companies can no longer afford not to take their printing systems seriously – this is necessary in today’s competitive environment,” concludes Van Lier.