Last week, Printable released Printable 5.0, a new platform and an innovative application suite with almost 100 new features. It offers an end-to-end solution that provides printing companies with everything needed to deliver robust, branded online services to their own customers. The platform incorporates capabilities to handle custom RFQ-driven ordering, as well as the industry’s most sophisticated and flexible media-catalog-based ordering, featuring custom-print, inventory picks and print-on-demand capabilities.

It gave us a great excuse to round up their 3 top executives to discuss this release and their plans for 2002. Jim Sullivan is Chairman of the Board and CEO, Coleman Kane is President and COO and Charles Gehman is Executive Vice President and CTO. The three team to discuss:

- Transition from 2001 while digesting 2 acquisitions
- Growth plans for 2002, more acquisitions?
- ROI and enhancements to Printable Version 5.0
- Adoption rates with e-commerce
- CIP4, PrintTalk and print management systems
- PrintPlanet.com and serving the associations

Sullivan brings over 30 years management experience in the printing industry. He is former chairman and CEO of Sullivan Communications, a $700 million dollar printing and graphic arts services company, serving the retail, newspaper, magazine, book software documentation and prepress industries. Prior to that Sullivan served as President and CEO of Maxwell Communications, building that company from start-up to a $1 billion dollar printing and publishing company, the printing part of that company today serves as the basis of Quebecor Printing Company, North America’s largest printer.

With nearly 20 years of management and marketing experience, Kane is responsible for the sales, marketing, and day to day operations of the company. Kane previously served as President and CEO of Games2Learn, a privately held Direct Response/Internet company that manufactured and sold educational products including The Phonics Game. Prior to Games2Learn, Kane served as President of MTA Schools, a private post-secondary school providing training for employment in the transportation industry.

Charles “Chuck” Gehman sets the company’s strategic technical direction while managing the company’s intellectual property. Gehman directs the research development of all Printable services and software, and is responsible for technology partnerships. Formerly vice president of technology for DAX, Gehman was responsible for the design, development, management, and delivery of application services, as well as the company’s professional services organization. Gehman was the primary architect of PrintPlanet.com, the popular e-community for the graphic communications industry.

Q: Because we are at the start of a new year, look back and tell us the changes that took place during 2001 for Printable.

Sullivan: 2001 was a great year for Printable, despite the economic downturn and the tragic and tumultuous events of the latter half of the year. We increased our revenue seven fold, acquired Collabria and PrintPlanet, and perhaps most importantly, continued to serve our existing customers and added many new ones.

Kane: We ended the year with just over 200 printer customers, and they bring us more than 600 corporate companies using our applications. Some of the largest and best known companies in America are now using our software on a daily basis; companies like AT&T, Delta Airlines, Dow Corning, E-Trade, KPMG Consulting, Lifetime Networks, Rydex Funds.

Sullivan: But don't forget, we are still selling only to Printers. But we're working very closely with those printing company customers to sell through to their clients-- we'll do Webex demos and help them answer RFPs. We want to provide a high level of support so they can be successful with this new way of doing business.

Q: You own PrintPlanet.com, the web based forum community and you power several web sites for industry associations. How do these efforts relate to the business goal of selling solutions to printers?

Gehman: Those of us that visit WhatTheyThink every day have probably heard of Printable by now. But it still amazes me that there are people out there that just haven't. That's the great benefit to us in owning PrintPlanet and in our work with the associations... it's a better way to get the word out than just doing tradeshows and advertising. So on a basic level, it helps us drive awareness of Printable in the marketplace.

Sullivan: But even more important, we think that a strong industry means a strong Printable. PrintPlanet helps make the industry stronger by providing a platform where people can share knowledge and network with their peers and with the vendors. The associations we support have similar missions and are promoting standards for the industry that will greatly benefit everyone. So we're proud to put our technology behind groups like DDAP, SWOP, TAGA and the R+E Council and Digital SmartFactory.


Q: What's happening with adoption rates right now among printers?

Kane: It's increasing greatly. We are doing as many as fifteen demos per day-- it's tremendous. I think a number of factors are driving this. First, we are better at communicating the value proposition... obviously, that helps a lot [Laughs]. Second, there's less competition. In 2000 and going into early 2001 before many of the "dotcom" failures, there was a lot of confusion among Printers-- and fear, uncertainty and doubt created by a lot of those now-failed companies. That's all gone today. So Printers can take the time to learn about our solutions and understand how we can help improve their business.


Q: The shake-out - do you feel like Printable has made it to the other side as a survivor from 2001 and tell us about your strength in terms of financial stability.

Sullivan: Yes, we made it! With our strong revenue growth, and with profitability in sight, the great support from our investors and our customers, we have a bright future. We took a conservative approach during 2001 and really worked to get our technology right. With the strategic acquisitions we made, we are extremely well positioned for continued success this year and in the future.

Kane: We think that there are opportunities out there for us to make further acquisitions this year. Both to obtain additional technologies we deem as strategic, and to increase our customer base quickly.

Sullivan: It is clear that Printable will be a large and important company in the next couple of years.


Q: PrintTalk - Are you working on standards as desired by this group and does a Printable solution really require a complete integration into a print management system?

Gehman: We are one of the founding members of PrintTalk, and we're also a member of the CIP4 consortium. PrintTalk has been embraced as part of CIP4, so the work that we had done before we joined CIP4 was applicable. We are actively developing software to support both of these initiatives, and we do see them as key to our future. For example, our new RFQ/Quote/Order system in Printable 5.0 uses XML forms internally that are based on specifications from PrintTalk. While that wasn't necessary for what we're doing, or to create interoperability, we thought it was a cool thing to do and that we could leverage that work as other vendors start to implement PrintTalk and CIP4.

Kane: As for integration with print management systems, it is something that we think could be valuable for our Printer customers. However, since we have over 200 customers today enjoying the system, it clearly is not necessary. And what you'll find is that no print management system really dominates the market-- there may be as many as 10,000 of those types of systems out there. Estimates vary, but there may be as many as 65,000 establishments in the printing industry in the US alone-- so the number of companies who do not have print management systems dwarfs the number that do use them.

Gehman: We're getting requests for other types of integration more than we are being asked to interface to print management systems. For example, our Ariba and SAP interfaces have gotten to be very popular. And we have interfaced to a variety of inventory systems used by printers and fulfillment companies. Our new PrintGateway system in Printable 5.0 lets us support more than 140 different flavors of XML, and enables us to support legacy systems with flat files. Small printers and large printers alike are being asked by their corporate customers to interface with systems of all kinds-- whether it is inventory, accounting or "e-procurement" and we want to be able to satisfy those types of requests, because that is a way we can help bring more money into the till for our Printer partners.


Q: Today, you announced Printable 5.0. Tell us about this product.

Kane: Printable 5.0 represents the next generation of e-business for the graphic arts industry. It's both a new platform and a new application suite. Almost 100 new features are the result of a year's development efforts. We incorporated tremendous input from customers, both the Printers and their corporate customers.

Gehman: I want take a moment, if I may, to congratulate our engineering team for their heroic work on this release. Many long nights went into this release and the quality shows... our people really poured their hearts into this.

Sullivan: This is truly usable stuff, with a real ROI, that improves the Printer's business and their relationship with their customers.

Gehman: Both the Printer's Dashboard, our flagship interface for Printers, and the PrintOne Customer Center, the private "intranet-like" interface for the printer's most valued customers, have received a new look-and-feel, many new features, performance improvements and streamlined workflows. Those are the most visible changes, but the system has new and better technology throughout.


Q: Compare Printable 5.0 to your previous set of solutions and also to competitive products.

Kane: Compared to our previous set of solutions, customers will find a higher level of integration. Across the product suite, everything works together seamlessly and is intuitive and easy to use. It's faster and easier-- and that means a lot, because our products have always been fast and easy!

Gehman: What I would say about the competition is that they are all primarily "point" solutions; i.e., a single application or a couple of applications. We are providing an end-to-end suite that gives our customers a deep set of solutions, based on an extensible platform, with which they can grow. You really have to look closely at these companies to see what's going on and get past the hype... for example, Collabria (who we acquired last year) itself was a one-product company. It was an excellent product, and now that technology is one part of our PrintOne Customer Center.

Kane: We aren't trying to do everything, though. We are partnering with companies like Markzware and ZipProof where appropriate to plug their applications into our suite. And we are talking to numerous other companies whose products are complimentary to what we are doing and would add value to our suite.

Gehman: But when we do an integration with another application, it has to make business sense and we must be able to seamlessly integrate that technology with our stuff-- so the customer doesn't have to learn a new interface and can start taking advantage of the new technology right out of the gate. We are an "appliance-like" model and as an appliance, you push a button and get what you want, without reading a big thick manual!


Q: Many say that putting real dollar savings on improving workflow is difficult to do - as compared to paying 10% less for a consumable product. Can you quantify savings for printers when they select Printable 5.0?

Sullivan: Our solutions take real cost out of the front-end and the back-end of the printing process. Handling orders, controlling errors and waste, preventing miscommunication. On the back-end, some of our solutions completely eliminate pre-press processes; that means the job can be on the press more quickly and out the door and billed more quickly.

Kane: Streamlining the customer relationship, moving away from telephone calls, faxes and in some cases, in-person visits to pick up jobs, all that frees up the sales people to sell new business. I think there was a time last year when sales people might have been threatened by e-commerce systems, but today, they are the ones who are buying our solutions!

Sullivan: With tighter deadlines, competitive pressures, more demanding customers and a slow economy, all these things matter even more than ever. We can help our customers get more business from existing relationships, achieve better margins on that business, and sell new customers.


Q: Describe the pricing for 5.0. Will current customers upgrade and will there be ways to purchase portions of the application?

Kane: Our pricing remains affordable, flat rate, monthly subscription fees. There is no cost to upgrade; our subscription fees include all support, software maintenance and upgrades to the system. Pricing is "Ala-Carte", so customers choose which applications they want and what functionality they want.

Gehman: As of today, all of our customers are using the Printable 5.0 suite. The transition occured over the last week and was relatively painless for our customers. Almost all of our existing customers attended "Webinars" where we walked them through the new Dashboard and PrintOne Customer Center interfaces in advance of the launch. We provided them with QuickStart guides for both of those products in
advance.

Kane: Some of our customers had been using the system for over a month in the beta program, and provided some great feedback.

Gehman: One last comment on the pricing I would throw out is that there's also no equipment to buy and maintain (or to have become obsolete) and no IT staff requirements for companies to take advantage of our solutions. This model helps companies achieve an ROI more quickly.


Q: Last year when we spoke about customers, you mentioned that you were working your way to having 1000 printers using your system. Will 5.0 help you reach that goal in 2002 and what is the significance of that number?

Sullivan: Without question, Printable 5.0 will help us achieve our goals in 2002. The product speaks for itself; when a printer or corporate customer sees a demo today, they can immediately understand the benefits that this software will afford them.

Kane: I think the real significance of having 1000 printers using Printable is that we then have critical mass as the market leader. The installed base we have today is substantial. We've been pleasantly surprised by the number of larger printing companies ($30m-$100m sales) that have adopted our software.

Sullivan: We have tens of thousands of employees at Fortune 1000 companies who have access to this software everyday. For example, 8000 worldwide Dow Corning employees use our applications to create their own business cards and stationary, and to purchase On-Demand Printing for marketing materials, product data sheets and the like. That is something we don't talk about much because of our focus on the printer. But that means a tremendous amount to our printer customers and to us-- so we are actively developing solutions that address that installed base.