London – At Ipex 2010, visitors took the opportunity to experience live demonstrations from Ricoh's expanded portfolio and discover, first-hand, how it is adding value and supporting business productivity and profitability into the future. "This Ipex will be remembered as signifying the long-awaited regeneration of the printing business with digital printing at the forefront," said Peter Williams, Executive Vice President, Ricoh Production Printing Business Group.

"In addition to the contracts signed on our stand, we have met with a diverse range of international businesses.  The new business pipeline generated has exceeded our expectations and we look forward to building on the new relationships gained."

"Ipex also marked a milestone in Ricoh's significant growth and success in the production printing market.  In the past two years our sales figures, according to InfoSource, show that Ricoh has grown to become the second largest provider of cut sheet colour presses for the European market and maintains its number one position in mono production print placements in Europe."

With many hundreds of one-to-one demonstrations during the eight day show, visitors took the opportunity to see Ricoh's end-to-end solutions at work.  1,000 children's colouring books, produced on the Ricoh Pro C900 will be donated to London's Great Ormond Street Hospital for Children NHS Trust.

Supporting customers to grow their print business
Visitors were also attracted to the Ricoh Business Driver Programme with many customers signing up to benefit from the service and support it is providing.  A printing company owner from the Netherlands highlighted a key component: "The vertical marketing guides are a great tool to help us break into new markets."  Under the programme, Ricoh invited visitors to a series of daily seminars in the Ricoh Business Driver Theatre. Dr. Robert Dekena, founder of consultancy firm Dokulog, shared the results of a recent UK study on the 'Future of the Press Room' and revealed the growing need for UK print rooms to modernise, invest in new efficiencies (via web-to print for example) and seek new opportunities to build total volumes.

Strategic alliances and partnerships announced
Ricoh highlighted its partnership with InfoPrint Solutions. "Together we will offer the best approach for our customers, ensuring seamless service and support – before, during and after implementation", said Williams. The launch of the new InfoPrint Solutions identity also marked a strong and positive partnership for the future. It leverages the strengths of Ricoh while providing InfoPrint Solutions with the opportunity to expand its credibility and leadership in the market.  Benoit Chatelard, Senior Vice President and General Manager, InfoPrint Solutions EMEA said, "Customers will benefit from the combined power of Ricoh and InfoPrint Solutions.   We will be providing one of the market's broadest portfolios of solutions.  We can fulfil customers' requirements even better together and will ensure that they benefit fully from our expanding offerings."

Ricoh also announced its worldwide strategic alliance with DirectSmile GmbH, a leading supplier of software for variable data printing and cross-media marketing, and a pan-European partnership with Duplo International to expand Ricoh's range of complete digital print-to-finish systems.

Breadth of production printing solutions
Some of the contracts signed at the Ricoh stand included the Ricoh Pro C720 which was publicly demonstrated for the first time in Europe.  The first pan-European demonstrations of NowPrint for Web-to-Print and Ready4Print Colour Server were also hosted at Ipex 2010. They provided print service providers with a unique insight into how easy it is to install and use these latest solutions in their business.

"Ipex 2010 presented Ricoh with an ideal opportunity to show print service providers our latest and expanded portfolio of services, products and solutions, while demonstrating our unshakeable commitment to providing our customers with world-class services. We are excited about the future and the show has given us added time with printing businesses to answer their questions and to demonstrate how Ricoh is adding value and supporting productivity and profitability," says Williams.