Guests at Ricoh’s Roadshow in Melbourne.
Ricoh Australia hosted an exclusive evening in its Melbourne showroom this week. The event kicked off its national roadshow, showcasing its latest innovative technology and printing advancements. Ricoh also revealed its big plans for Drupa 2024.
Sprinter spoke to chief sales and marketing officer, Tina Economou and national sales manager, Mark Moro about drupa 2024, Ricoh’s ambitions in the Australian market and its new platforms.
Products on show at the event included the newly launched Pro C7500 and Pro C9500 models. These products are an upgrade of the Ricoh C7200 and the 9200. Moro said the progression into the new models has been a result of the industry’s requests for ‘better image quality, media capabilities, productivity and better operator efficiencies’.
“This is what we have done, and we have done a great job on the new engines,” says Moro.
Moro presented a sneak peek into the Henkaku-verse, Ricoh’s extraordinary Drupa 2024 two-story stand complete with café, theatre and product showroom. He encouraged everyone who is visiting to come and see them at the Ricoh exhibit.
Guests at the roadshow event also experienced the yet-to-be-launched Pro Z75, which will also be showcased at Drupa. The team at Ebina, Ricoh’s technology centre in Japan, created an exclusive and personalised video taking guests through the Pro75. As a memento of the night, guests received a personalised, labelled bottle of wine.
Moro says Ricoh’s approach to the Australian market is selected and focused, while Economou says the business has done a lot of work engaging customers and assessing needs before bringing products to market.
Economou says Drupa 2024 presents an excellent opportunity for the sales team and the analysts to engage with Ricoh’s customers and for the teams to look at what else is happening in the global market, that doesn’t make it to Australia.
“Getting that opportunity for the teams to go out, see what’s happening, learn from others, and bring those insights back to the customers who perhaps aren’t able to get to drupa, to me is a critical part,” says Economou.
“Drupa is the innovation hub. Customers get to see automation, finishing, work with all of our partners, get to see how everything connects.”
“But it’s also about the voice of the customer, getting that feedback is the critical piece because it goes back into influencing innovation,” Economou concludes.
Comment below to have your say on this story.
If you have a news story or tip-off, get in touch at editorial@sprinter.com.au.
Sign up to the Sprinter newsletter