Sales of copiers, printers and multifunctional devices are up about 6 percent for the year in Europe Africa and the Middle East. But while many of those devices may be color, monochrome printing continues to maintain its share in North America.

In the USA and Canada, Lyra Research, Newtonville, Mass., teamed up with PrintFleet, a Kingston, Ontario, Canada, firm to launch the Office Print Monitor in January. In a survey of 17 North American companies with an average of 1.7 million pages starting in June of 2006, there was an investment of almost $440,000 in new hardware with almost half in color hardware.

But the study found color printing still increased only 2 percent. Lyra attributed the almost-flat increase to the worker perceived color was much more expensive, so opted for monochrome.

The study of Europe, Middle East and Africa (EMEA) by Gartner, Stamford, Conn., showed almost a 6 percent increase in devices in the first half of 2007. The total was over 34 million units in that time period, and predictions are that there will be 54 million units for the year. Gartner found that of that total, 53 percent was from copier and MFP sales and Hewlett-Packard was the leader among the inkjet markets. In the EMEA market, HP, Canon, Epson, Lexmark and Brother are the top shippers of product.

Footnote - Xerox making headway in digital color. Xerox recently announced that in 2006, over 30 billion color pages were produced with its technology. Infotrends, Weymouth, Mass., says about 50 percent of page volume worldwide is from digital high-speed production printers. Recently, Xerox announced enhancements for its latest iGen3 digital presses from Creo, demonstrated at Graph Expo, the press-production extravaganza in Chicago earlier this month. Xerox FreeFlow Print Server for workflow is not only for the iGen3, but also for the DocuColor 242/252/260 Digital Color Printer/Copier. Cost is $75,000 for the iGen3 and $25,000 for the DocuColor 242/252/260 Digital Color Printer/Copier.

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The monochrome continues to sell and evidence is in the fact that companies are offering products to capture black-and-white pages. An adjustable touch screen is one of the features of the e-Studio 450s/500s monochrome multifunctional offered by Toshiba America Business Solutions, Irvine, Calif.

The e-STUDIO450s/500s MFP from Toshiba prints and copies at a high speed of 45 pages-per-minute (PPM) (cost: $1,499) and 50 PPM for the 500s (cost: $2,999). Though monochrome, it can do color scanning and copying and faxing of documents up to legal-sized. The device can print PDFs and image files from a USB port interface located at the front of the machine.

On the e-STUDIO500s, a 40 GB hard drive is standard and allows color scan preview. There are multiple security features and Windows Vista compatibility.

Other imaging news:

- Konica Minolta opens another direct selling branch in Atlanta. A second branch location in the Atlanta metropolitan area has been acquired by Konica Minolta Business Solutions U.S.A., Ramsey, N.J.

- Global Imaging acquires Marbaugh Reprographics Supply Co. Global Imaging, a subsidiary of Xerox, has recently acquired Marbaugh Reprographics Supply Company, Indianapolis, Ind.

- Canon U.S.A. and Barr Systems Sign MEAP Licensing Agreement. Canon U.S.A., Lake Success, N.Y., and Barr Systems, LLC, Gainesville, Fla., have announced Barr Systems is licensing Canon's Multifunctional Embedded Application Platform (MEAP) Software, making an interface between Barr server software and the Canon imageRUNNER MFPs.

- bizhub series introduced by Konica Minolta Business Solutions U.S.A. The bizhub C30PX (31 ppm color,37 monochrome, $2,570, longer warranty) and bizhub C30P (31 ppm color, $2.271) are the first in a series of bizhub network printers designed to expand Konica Minolta's portfolio of bizhub imaging solutions.

- Hewlett-Packard disputes Australian research. HP has disputed research that some HP laser printers may be a health risk to office and home computer users and rejected that emissions pose a danger.

- You can get an executive chair from 'The Donald.' Staples has the Varick, Bedford, Briarcliff, Bedminster and Westchester chairs named for billionaire baron Donald Trump. Two models are in leather, two with leather and velvet and chenille and the lower-priced model is chenille with costs from $349.99 to $549.99.

The full gamut of Pantone's Goe system will now be available to Xerox customers under an agreement between Xerox and Pantone, Carlstadt, New Jersey, In addition, X-Rite is buying Pantone for $180 million.

The Goe system is one of the first new Pantone color system in about 45 years. Taking four years to produce, the array is for 2,000 new Pantone colors. The alliance will provide links between software and hardware. Color wheels make it simple to choose colors and other features allow experimentation.

Pantone and X-Rite have had a partnership to provide color-management solutions for about two years. The buy for $180 million is expected to further enhance the revenue for X-Rite in the future.

We've all been there. The bills and income are getting too tight and it's time to go ask your boss for a raise. What is the best approach?

First, do your homework. If your production has increase, document it and take the figures with you. You don't have to be Perry Mason, but most bosses will give a raise to a deserving employee who presents their case in a professional manner.

Be humble, yet convincing. You have to make the facts stick and avoid showing too much ego. He's holding the cash sack and you have to show in a calm manner that you deserve the raise.

We all have expenses. Bosses do, too. But leave dramatics to the writers and make your reasons based on something other than emotion. That also means don't become angry if the request is denied or threaten to quit. That's unprofessional.

You're there on your merit. No matter what anyone else in the company has done or how much more you've done than them, you're talking about your request. If you keep it to that subject, the boss will respect you more.

If it's because of another offer, that's OK. Make sure you let him know you're intending to stay - if you are. But if you have another offer somewhere else, it's not a bad time to bring it up. That has risks. If your record is less than exemplary, it could backfire and the boss could encourage you to leave.

Appalachia Business Communications is located in the rapidly-growing Tri-Cities Area in the southern Appalachian Mountain foothills of Southwest Virginia and East Tennessee. NASCAR fans know the area as the home of the Bristol Motor Speedway, part of the NASCAR Winston Cup, Busch, All Pro and Dash series.

Jeff Eaves started working for company sales in 1985 after military service. He and his father, Jack, who joined in 1983, are co-owners of the 11-person dealership in Johnson City, Tenn. The company was founded in Knoxville, Tenn. by Paul Fowler in 1973.

Appalachia Business Communications became a Toshiba distributor in 1998. With Toshiba, multifunctional eBridge modules can be added to equipment as needed, Eaves said, depending on the needs of the business system.

"That's one thing that Toshiba has done very well for us since we became a distributor in '98," Jeff Eaves said. "If you leased a piece of equipment, they would provide a way to put a print enabler in it, and that has helped us to get a lot of our products on the network while some other companies have not thought it too important. We had an early vision that it would be good to have a copy system on the network that would function as a printer. Now scanning has been the biggest thing the past year."

Color and color scanning has changed their market the past few years, he said. Applications can be surprising, he said, restoration companies scanning color photos of restorations to document insurance claims.

Appalachia Business Communications puts high value customer service in addition to giving the customer appropriate technology. "In our business, the close of the sale is the beginning of the relationship, not the end," Jeff Eaves said.

Panasonic and the World Wide Fund for Nature have agreed to conserve the marine life in the Yellow Sea, located between Korea and China.

The seven-year regional conservation project will support the conservation by area activities to enhance the protection and management of the wildlife habitat of the Yellow Sea. It is supported by Panasonic, a brand of Matsushita Electric Industrial Co., Ltd., based in Kadoma, Osaka Prefecture, Japan, and the World Wide Fund for Nature (WWF). The WWF was formerly named the World Wildlife Fund and is an international non-governmental organization for the conservation, research and restoration of the environment.

The Yellow Sea Ecoregion is one of 238 in the world where conservation is a priority. It is has a high diversity of biological life due to the continental shelves and has been an abundant fishing and recreation area from the age of the ancients. The vision is for a three-stage plan with the third stage ending in 2014.

HP has decided that the everyday problems with its equipment can be solved visually easier than with technical support, so has a number of video resources aboard devices for problems such as paper jams.

The self-help features include the videos and step-by-step instructions for use of the control panel instructions to avoid the call jams at the IT help desk. The technology is built into the new CM8060 printer, which uses the new Edgeline technology that has ultra-wide printheads for faster printing.

Sensors will let the printer know where the jam is and a video will show how to clear it. The videos are directed at the location of the jam, which is also located through LED lights.

The videos are not for altruistic reasons, though. Help desk calls cost companies like HP money. That's why it's becoming more common for a 20 buck charge or more when the desk is called.

Sales Representative - Chicago

Riso Technician Vancouver, BC Canada

Konica Technician Seattle, WA

Sales Manager, Los Angeles, CA

Joplin, MO Sales Rep

Kyocera Mita Technician Desert Cities, CA

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