HP

Compete to win.

In a global economy the competition never sleeps, so it’s not enough to simply keep pace with change—you have to discover innovative ways to turn that change to competitive advantage. For IT and facilities managers the challenge is especially daunting. Not only must you enable the day-to-day functioning of critical business processes, you must be on the lookout for proven technologies that can produce a decisive business advantage, as well.

Converging technologies increase productivity and reduce costs.

Convergence is the latest trend in the information technology revolution. At its best, convergence produces enhanced capabilities at a lower cost by combining proven technologies. Multi-function products—MFPs—are a case in point.

Combining printing, copying, faxing, scanning and digital sending (scan to e-mail, folder, etc.) in a single device, HP MFPs give information workers network access solutions like a full-featured universal print driver. In short, MFPs are a valuable addition to any imaging and printing strategy designed to deliver more for less.

While their value is unquestionable, it is important that IT and FM work together to develop a coordinated output strategy to achieve optimum cost savings and productivity boosts. Plus you should also keep in mind not all MFPs are created equal. continue reading...

There’s more to running an efficient and cost-effective printing and imaging environment than just buying new devices. A well planned, strategic approach to managing printing and imaging can reduce costs and increase productivity through the entire
lifecycle of the devices in your state or local government agency. HP Total Print Management (TPM) can help by bringing together balanced deployment, optimized utilization and industry-leading networked technology to optimize operations.
Think about it: Evaluate your current needs, resources and costs.

Act on it: Plan strategic improvements and put them into place.

Work with it: Manage your optimized environment on an ongoing basis.

Get help with it: Learn more about how Hewlett-Packard can help.

Think about it
You can’t begin to reduce costs or increase productivity until you know how much time and money your
organization is currently devoting to meeting printing and imaging needs. That’s why the first step in a strategic
approach to management is a thorough assessment of your needs, existing resources and present costs. The questionnaire on the next page, while by no means exhaustive, can serve as a starting point for helping you establish a solid foundation for planning. continue reading...

Did you know that color is one of the easiest ways to increase sales?

Research indicates that using color and graphics increases interest, retention, and improves comprehension.

The facts:

• Color improves comprehension by 75%
• Color increases retention 40%
• Color accelerates learning by 20%¹

According to Kathleen H. Seelye, “Color and graphics add 78% retention, while a photo can result in a 130% increase in retention.”²

Use an Image to Almost Double Your Persuasiveness

A study conducted by the University of Minnesota found that the use of simple graphics increased the persuasiveness of a message by 47%. To measure the effect, they had a group of people read a passage of text and rate it for persuasiveness. Then they had another group rate the exact same text, only this time it included a graphic. The score jumped by 47%!³ continue reading...

Through the 1990s innovation and creative pricing models fueled the acquisition of office technology – especially printers and copiers. A booming economy and healthy corporate bottom lines provided little incentive for IT administrators or facilities managers to invest in efficient and effective devices to meet user needs. Consequently, the population of printers and copiers grew — reducing utilization rates and increasing service and support costs. According to InfoTrends/CAP Ventures, imaging and printing vendors report the average utilization rate for most office equipment is somewhere between 2% and 6%1 — not a very good return on the technology investment.

Over the last few years a more competitive business climate has forced organizations to look for areas where costs can be cut without jeopardizing efficiency. The hardcopy environment is a logical candidate for change. IDC reports enterprises spend 1% to 5% of their annual revenues on document production, distribution, storage, retrieval and repurposing.2 To put that in context, documents could cost a business with annual revenues of $10 million as much as half a million each year. It would be money well spent if that investment actually yielded business value, but unfortunately the research also suggests organizations could be spending their dollars much more carefully and achieve cost savings of 13% to 40% and increase productivity through effective fleet management. continue reading...

The IT security climate has changed. While in the past the challenge has been to convince customers of the need for security, the current need is to show how a product’s security capabilities complement a customer’s existing security environment.

Security measures have evolved through the years, from firewalls that kept intruders out, to sophisticated virus throttling systems that detect viruses before they take hold and prevent them from spreading. Attacks now often originate from inside the network, for example: employees take advantage of access, wireless networks are improperly secured, and unaware users introduce viruses or worms to the secure network.

As attacks increase in sophistication, hardening the internal network’s security—from clients and servers to the imaging and printing infrastructure—becomes critical. Further, regulatory requirements, including Sarbanes-Oxley and the Health Insurance Portability Protection Act, are mandating protection accountability. continue reading...

Is a picture really worth a thousand words? In this age of multimedia and mass communication, it often seems so. Recent research supports the idea that visual communication can be more powerful than verbal communication, suggesting in many instances that people learn and retain information that is presented to them visually much better than that which is only provided verbally. These are welcome findings to anyone whose work involves using visual presentations to persuade or instruct others. Even more welcome is the news that today, presenters have more resources than ever available to them for creating and displaying the most visually rich programs possible.

Communicating Effectively In The Visual Age
Visual communication is everywhere today, from electronic media like Web pages and television screens to environmental contexts such as road signs and retail displays. As the National Education Association has pointed out, ”Western civilization has become more dependent than ever on visual culture, visual artifacts, and visual communication as a mode of discourse and a means of developing a social and cultural identity.” 1 That’s an interesting observation, but what’s even more intriguing is that there is evidence to suggest that people not only communicate visually more than ever, they also communicate better when they communicate visually. This is an important revelation to those who create presentations for work or education and who want to make those presentations as compelling and effective as possible. This paper is designed to help presenters make the most of this information by describing the evidence for the power of visual communication, identifying the key components of effective visual presentations and discussing the technologies that make it possible to use these components to craft more successful presentations. continue reading...

HP today introduced two digital press solutions with capabilities that improve photo printing quality and color consistency.

The company also announced that output for HP Indigo presses has received a Wilhelm Imaging Research (WIR) Display Permanence rating of approximately 45 years, the first of its kind for a digital press.⁽¹⁾

The new press solutions are designed for photofinishers, professional photographers, yearbook publishers, print service providers and other graphic arts professionals.

• The HP Indigo WS6000p offers professional portrait output quality as a high-quality, low-cost replacement to silver-halide systems.
• The enhanced HP Indigo W7200 Digital Press improves color management and consistency for high-volume printing of photo specialty products, including photo books.

HP additionally launched a partner solution from M-photo to manage professional lab workflow for HP Indigo presses and silver-halide output devices. HP also announced the general availability of the ARTtrust self-certification system for photographers and artists using HP Designjet Z Series Professional Photo Printers.

“Digital has crossed the gap between traditional and digital photofinishing in terms of quality, productivity and consistency, and now digital printing surpasses silver halide for photo permanence,” said Christopher Morgan, senior vice president, Graphics Solutions Business, HP. “HP’s solutions are accelerating the shift to digital, creating new business opportunities for print service providers, publishers and photographers.” continue reading...

With the need for multiple printer brands, models, and devices within an organization to handle an assortment of printing needs, firms have become accustomed to supporting dozens (if not hundreds) of printer drivers as a necessary evil. This multi-driver environment results in higher costs, the negative aspects of which may have previously lacked consideration. With the arrival of the Universal Print Driver, this is an area where improvements can and must be made.

Hewlett-Packard recently announced the second iteration of its Universal Print Driver (UPD), which is focused on streamlining the print processes and operations within an organization by employing a single driver to handle all supported HP-branded devices. The benefits of a product like this appeared obvious. The necessary investment for UPD is minimal—the driver is essentially free, it requires little training, and it can be up and running within an organization in a matter of weeks. InfoTrends believed that the “return” on such an investment would be substantial for help desks and IT departments as well as end-users, offering a consistent printing experience across a multitude of devices. As this white paper will show, users are in fact experiencing a variety of benefits from this type of driver. continue reading...

HP today introduced a records management solution that enables customers to significantly reduce the business risks associated with the growing regulatory compliance and legal discovery demands.

HP TRIM 7 – an advanced records management solution built on 24 years of experience and best practices – enables organizations to transparently manage all of their Microsoft SharePoint Server records in a single environment, regardless of the source. This includes documents as well as information found in SharePoint Server blogs, wikis, discussions, forms, calendars and workflows.

Widespread adoption of SharePoint Server provides the opportunity to consolidate and simplify the management of content stored across multiple SharePoint instances. HP TRIM 7 enables the transparent capture, search and management of all types of physical and electronic business information, including Microsoft Office SharePoint Server 2007 and the upcoming SharePoint Server 2010.

“Organizations today need solutions to manage the explosion of large volumes of information,” said Mark Gilbert, research vice president, Gartner. “New solutions are growing rapidly for authoring and managing enterprise content in various formats and sources, and this trend is truly changing the way organizations do business.”

“The explosion in Content 2.0 blogs, wikis and discussions creates new information management challenges for organizations trying to meet an escalating set of regulation,” said Jonathan Martin, vice president and general manager, Information Management Solutions, HP. ”HP TRIM allows customers to marry records management best practices and governance with dynamic collaboration platforms such as SharePoint.” continue reading...

Independent studies by major auditing firms indicate that most businesses lose one out of every twenty documents they create or receive. The costs associated with lost or simply misfiled documents mount quickly.

In partnership with HP, Informa Software delivers a solution that eliminates the time wasted looking for documents and the cost of making unnecessary copies.

Simply scan from the front panel of an HP mfp and file your document with a few keywords. Unlike copier-based mfps, IQmfp allows the input of index keywords from your desktop. All document types and search fields are custom-definable. IQmfp will also capture documents from MS Office applications or any Windows file type through the native Windows “Send to” feature with a few keystrokes.

Security at the document type, user and group levels insure that only authorized users gain access to documents.

Using an intuitive browser-based search, IQmfp can find documents by keywords or data ranges. Documents are displayed in the industry-standard Adobe® PDF Reader, allowing you to save, print, e-mail or even fax as necessary. IQmfp saves you money by dramatically reducing labor and other operational costs. Fewer trips to the filing cabinet and copier mean more employee productivity. Finding information quicker means being more responsive to customers, which translates directly into a competitive advantage. continue reading...