Print.IT Reseller - issue 85

PRINTITRESELLER.UK VOX POP 47 Utilising cloud-based printing services means drivers and compatibility issues are no longer a concern, which in turns lowers the burden on help desk and IT staff David Warrington, Client Services Director, Office Fox : “We are starting to see more requests to offer some kind of cloud-based service to clients, and yes it will be a growth area as it goes hand in hand with the new more agile workplace. “It has a double impact with workers wanting to be more flexible in and out of the workplace and companies needing to make sure they can do so in a cost-effective and more environmentally- friendly way. Utilising cloud-based printing services means drivers and compatibility issues are no longer a concern, which in turns lowers the burden on help desk and IT staff. It also allows workers to benefit from BYOD making the switch between working from home and the office much more seamless.” www.officefox.co.uk Steve Holmes, EMEA Regional Director, PaperCut: “With the emergence of cloud services as a cost-effective alternative to on-premises hardware in the print management space, a growing number of businesses are transitioning to cloud- based print management solutions. Cloud services can potentially enhance security, scalability, and mobility. Print management is undoubtedly a slice of that pie. Furthermore, cloud opens the door for a flexible, resilient, and reliable alternative to traditional data centre services. It offers room to add on and scale-up as well as a reduced print spend, increased ROI and a lower IT team burden. “While that’s all good news, there’s another side to the debate though that needs to be considered. When it comes to migrating existing customers to cloud print management, MSPs need to be mindful of what their customers may be giving up. Put simply, cloud print management solutions – including PaperCut Hive – are not as feature- rich as their on-premises counterparts; not yet, anyway. That’s the nature of technical development – it will take time for cloud print management to reach parity with traditional solutions. “Therefore, it’s more important than Christoph Hammer, Senior Vice President Cloud Services, ThinPrint : “Yes, absolutely. Quocirca also states that service providers covering more than just one or a few areas are the preferred choice of customers. With a cloud-based print service, MPS providers can extend their service easily and include their customers’ users’ devices. Being able to truly handle ‘everything printing’ including the support of all user devices a customer has now as well as in the future, and not being limited to a specific printer vendor is a powerful message that sets the vendor apart from competitors. “One could argue that this can also be achieved without cloud printing services but in most cases the complexity of supporting ever changing individual endpoints as well as increasing tightening of access to customers’ environments, makes this a less attractive business proposition. When looking at the print channel, we should not forget the opportunity that arises for other managed service providers. Cloud print services makes it attractive for MSPs to enhance their service offering and including traditional MPS services.” www.thinprint.com Kerry Rush, Product Manager, Sharp UK : “Absolutely – cloud is the future, so we need to have the people and skills in place to allow us to aid with the migration. From a customers’ perspective, especially for SMBs, the move to cloud can be a daunting thought with fears over costs, implementation and impact on the business. Sharp has the solutions and expertise to be a technology partner for our customers to guide and support them through this transition.” www.sharp. co.uk continued... Steve Holmes Kerry Rush Christop Hammer David Warrington