Fuji Xerox opens Asia-Pacific customer experience centre in Samut Prakan

Masashi Honda, senior vice president of Fuji Xerox and chief executive for Asia-Pacific, said that although the company had an ICEC facility in Australia, the Thai centre would be the first to offer a full suite of production printing capabilities and would serve customers in the Asia-Pacific and Oceania regions. 

The 3,600-square-metre Thai ICEC will collaborate with the two other major hubs of Fuji Xerox in Japan: the Customer Value Innovation Centre in Yokohama and the Inkjet Engagement Centre in Ebina. It will perform not as just a showroom or demonstration facility for production printers, but also as a workshop for customers to come to test and benchmark results, as well as to collaborate closely with the company to develop new printing applications in a simulated customer environment.

Part of the facility was moved from Singapore, which retains a solutions showroom, Honda said. 

Sources said the August 17 bombing in Bangkok had prompted Fuji Xerox to postpone its plan to organise a grand opening for the ICEC facility where guests from the Asia-Pacific region would be invited, and scaled it down to only a media visit yesterday.

Nevertheless, Honda told the press that Fuji Xerox had put in US$5 million (Bt178 million) as an initial investment in the Thai ICEC facility and would “enhance it in the near future”.

 

Print-on-demand 

Shuji Aso, corporate vice president of Fuji Xerox, said the Thai ICEC facility would contribute to the company’s strategy to expand its print-on-demand (POD) business, also known as production printing, in the Asia-Pacific region.

“The production-printing business is very important. It currently accounts for less than 10 per cent of the graphic communications market in Asia-Pacific, which means we have a huge opportunity to expand. In the US and Europe, POD already accounts for 20-30 per cent of the market,” he said.

Honda said Fuji Xerox chose Thailand to host its first full-range regional ICEC facility because of its geographical advantage as a centre of Asean and its accessibility to other Asia-Pacific nations, its low costs and availability of talent. Notable features provided at the centre are:

Professional and technical personnel with a wide range of skill sets in areas like colour management, Web-integration workflow, design, pre-press and print production to assist customers in conducting end-to-end application testing, and provide consultation on ways to increase efficiencies and reduce waste and errors;

Display of Fuji Xerox’ expertise in 1:1 personalisation and cross-media communications;

Facilities for media testing on various papers and developing of industrial print applications, such as photobooks, manuals and barcodes, which are important functions for production printers to answer business needs;

Training workshops focusing on Fuji Xerox’ range of business solutions and applications and seminars on industry and market trends. Courses are available for developing practical skills in specialised job categories, as well as integrated training programmes addressing work and management challenges.