The global market for document solutions – printers, scanners and document management – is going through a period of rapid, profound change as a result of the proliferation of mobile devices and broadband connectivity. Opportunities for growth are opening up as a result, according to new market research from IDC.
Spanning six countries and three world regions, in producing its “Mobile Device Users/Non-Users: Print, Scan, Document Management, Worldwide” report IDC found that large and medium-size businesses are leading the way when it comes to mobile device adoption. They account for 54 percent of organizations’ smartphone and/or tablet users, IDC highlights in a press release.
Among vertical industry groups Information Technology, Wholesale, Trade, Banking, Life Sciences, Resource Industries and Securities have a significantly higher percentage of smartphone and/or tablet users.
“The business value for smartphone/tablet printing is enormously clear, and yet support for this is shockingly lacking in 2015,” Angèle Boyd, group VP GM, IDC Document Solutions, pointed out. “This is a huge missed productivity opportunity for both businesses and print providers.”
Demand for Mobile Device Printing
Three-quarters of survey respondents said the business value of mobile printing is similar to that of PC printing. Another 15 percent said it is greater.
Speed of reviewing documents, customer satisfaction, number of transactions processed and number of new customers were cited as the four biggest benefits. More than half (56 percent) said they aren’t satisfied with current availability of mobile printing and document solutions.
As smartphone and tablet usage continues to grow the result is significant pent-up demand, IDC says. The market research company estimates that 35 percent of smartphone users and 34 percent of tablet users can’t print but want to.
Other key report takeaways include:
- Smartphone and tablet users prefer to read documents on a PC rather than in print, but they prefer to read documents in print rather than on a smartphone or tablet (likely due to screen size). Indeed, they have a greater tendency to print from their PC than non-users.
- Survey respondents expect their share of prints from smartphones and tablets to increase from 20-21% today to 28-30% in three years.
- IDC’s mobile print forecast for six countries studied is a huge bright spot with double-digit growth compared to flat to declining growth for the rest of the print market.
- Cloud file services and smartphone/tablet camera use have the highest usage rates among document solutions tested.
- Top scan drivers in the study include the company is scanning more documents, cost to store electronically is lower than print cost, security related to documents, green/sustainable environment, smartphone information access anywhere/anytime, and tablet information access anywhere/anytime.
- Smartphone and/or tablet users make significant use of the camera on their device for document capture.
- Smartphone/tablet users are more likely than non-users to scan a wide range of document types, especially accounting, financial, legal, education, marketing/customer communications, and sales documents.
