By Arjay L. Balinbin, Senior Reporter
CANON can no longer rely on its hardware products alone, such as copiers, printers, and scanners, because many organizations have gone paperless due to the pandemic, a company official said.
“Traditionally, we counted on our hardware business; now, we are expanding our business by offering digitization and automation service and security solutions,” Yasuhiko Shiraki, head of Canon Marketing (Philippines), Inc. Business Imaging Solutions, told BusinessWorld in a recent online interview.
More than 80% of the company’s revenue came from its hardware business prior to the pandemic. “During the pandemic, our hardware business dropped to some extent, and then we realized that we could not survive with it so we started offering new products,” Mr. Shiraki said.
He noted companies reduced their printing to a “great extent” during the pandemic because of the work-from-home setup and even the mobile working.
“Print volume was our bread and butter… The more people print, the more we can get revenue and profit,” he said.
“Even people are now working from home, we have to make our organization sustainable and profitable,” he added.
Asked when the company’s new products and services would become profitable, he said: “I think this year, we can make it happen.”
The company recently launched a security solution called Facial Access Control Temperature System or FACTS.
“From March to June last year, we were forced to work from home. But in July, we gradually started to go back to the office, but we needed to set up a safety protocol, including temperature checks and filling out health check forms every morning. We saw there were long queues to fill out forms, so we decided to set up FACTS,” Mr. Shiraki said.
What the device does is automatic contactless temperature screening with facial detection.
FACTS, which is equipped with infrared thermography, can achieve a “highly accurate reading of the user’s body temperature with a deviation of ±0.3 to help track and safeguard employees from the coronavirus disease 2019 (Covid-19),” Canon said.
The device, which can be fully customized, allows businesses to keep track of their employees and visitors for contact-tracing purposes. It is also capable of scanning company IDs to help expedite employees’ check-in.
Mr. Shiraki noted Canon is not reducing nor abandoning its hardware business.
“We don’t have any intention to reduce the hardware business. We are just expanding our solutions business in addition to our hardware business,” he said.
Canon Philippines recently partnered with the Department of Education (DepEd) for its production of learning modules.
“In our correspondence with the Region XI DepEd division, module production has been reduced by 50% with Canon’s smart sorting module printing services. We are looking forward to a longer partnership with DepEd in improving and enabling effective education in the midst of the new norm,” the company said.
