Canon middle east discusses ‘future of imaging technology’

Building on its "closer to customers" strategy, Canon Middle East, a leader in imaging solutions, hosted its 2012 Partner Conference from 5th to 7th December 2012 in Morocco under the theme: “Build the Future”. The conference, which brought together over 100 partners from 45 countries in the Middle East, North, West and East Africa region aimed to shed light on some of the new Canon innovations which will pave the way for the future of imaging technologies and connectivity. Over the years, Canon has seen its Middle East business catching up rapidly with global trends. While the global cloud computing market is anticipated to increase to $241 billion by 2020, the Middle East and Africa region is expected to have the highest cloud traffic growth rate – estimated at 79% Compound Annual Growth Rate (CAGR), followed by Latin America (66% CAGR), and Central and Eastern Europe (55% CAGR) – by 2016. Similarly, the number of web-connected devices is expected to grow more than fourfold by 2020, reaching a watershed of 50 billion devices globally. In light of these industry trends, Canon Middle East and its partners discussed a new phase of continuous innovation within the imaging industry, which constitutes the company’s vision for the future and the direction in which the industry at large is heading. Anurag Agrawal, Managing Director, Canon Middle East said: “In an ever changing environment, new technologies are constantly being integrated in everyday life. From input through cameras, to output through printers, Canon’s integrated cross media imaging solutions enable connectivity across different technology components including Canon’s own devices as well as other devices such as smart phones and tablets, Wi-Fi and cloud enabled devices. “From consumers to businesses, we aim to be everyone’s imaging partner. We foresee that the world is moving towards more integration and Canon’s unique strength in this respect lies in the wide range of products and services which provide an end to end solution to consumers and businesses. Catering to integration is thus allowing us to become closer to our customers and making technology more usable, thus enabling everyday life.” As one example, Canon's new integrated Wi-Fi functionality lets users transfer images to social networks, computers and portable devices in seconds. With predictions that 37% of worldwide workforce will be mobile by 2015, Canon’s WiFi support allows consumers to instantly send captured photos to smartphones or printers and share images online on social networking websites. From a business solutions perspective, the recently launched second generation imageRUNNER ADVANCE C5200 series represents an example of cloud connectivity at Canon. The series provides a unique set of capabilities from improved access control, personalization, service efficiency, print publishing and mobile and cloud connectivity. For instance, the new generation technology makes it possible to print from any internet enabled device using Google Cloud Print which means that connecting, sharing and printing lives is now easier than ever before. “We have built a solid foundation with our partners and we celebrated our special relationship with them during last year’s 10th anniversary celebrations for Canon Middle East under the theme of “Power of Partnership”. This year, we continue to capitalize on our core competencies providing both individual products and complete networked technology solutions for information input, management and output,” Agrawal concluded. In addition to presenting its business strategy and objectives for 2013, Canon Middle East utilized the conference to further enhance its operations across regional markets. In order to do so, the conference provided a platform for sharing best practices and ideas on key areas that Canon Middle East sees as imperative for the future of technology in the form of workshops and forums to support the 2013 action plan– these include Managed Print Services, IT services, and the impact of WiFi and cloud on connectivity. Looking ahead, Canon Middle East will continue to capitalize on its strength to drive growth through diversification, in addition to providing customers with future technologies while transforming businesses through enabling connectivity, offering cross media imaging and value added services. Canon launches over 100 products every year globally and is currently among the top five US patent holder for the 26th year. Canon is committed to the pursuit of cutting-edge R&D as a vital means to deliver unique, proprietary products and technology. In fiscal year 2011, the company invested ¥307.8 billion in R&D, accounting for 8.7% of sales.