JAPAN :PITNEY BOWES PARTNERS WITH CANON

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http://www.newstimes.com/ci_13017267
Japan:Pitney Bowes partners with Canon
Pitney Bowes has teamed with Canon to sell its DM100 postage meter to Japan’s small and medium-sized businesses as part of an overall effort to bolster product sales in that market.”We’re hoping with the kinds of resources that Canon has that we will be able to make inroads into that market,” said Lynette Koh, Pitney Bowes Japan’s vice president of marketing and postal relations for the Asia Pacific and Middle East.

Pitney Bowes Japan, a Tokyo-based branch of Stamford’s Pitney Bowes Inc., in July began selling the DM100 through a distribution agreement with Canon Marketing Japan to test Japan’s market of about one million small and medium-size businesses, Koh said.”There’s hope on both sides to expand beyond the DM100 to include inserters, folders and software systems,” she said. “The SME (small-medium enterprise) market has been tough, with fairly low growth, but it has been fairly consistent over the past two years.”

Pitney Bowes Japan has about 200 sales people selling the company’s postage meters, addressing systems and other products to the larger corporations, but the staff is not large enough to reach out to all small and medium-size businesses, Koh said.”We entered into the agreement with Canon to expand availability of Pitney Bowes’ products and achieve sales and customer base growth using our channel strategy,” she said.

Koh would not disclose Pitney Bowes’ sales revenue for products being sold to Japan’s small and  medium-size businesses or the price of the DM100.”Regarding the price of the DM100, we sell as a monthly lease payment, not a fixed price,” Koh said. “Everything depends on the services and features the customer wants.”

Pitney Bowes Japan, which has been selling Pitney Bowes’ products since its founding in 1981, would expand the partnership with Canon, depending on its success with the DM100, Koh said.”We will be looking at the successes and learning to replicate it for the other markets,” she said.

Pitney Bowes, which posted $6.3 billion in sales for 2008, saw sales revenue for this year’s second quarter decline 13 percent to $1.38 billion, from $1.59 billion for the same period last year, according to the company’s quarterly financials. International mailing revenue declined 28 percent, from $302.1 million to $217.9 million for the quarter, while worldwide production mail went down 13 percent, from $149.4 million to $130.1 million.

Revenue from U.S. mailing declined 8 percent, from $550.8 million to $505.1 million.
As a result of lagging global economy, Canon Marketing Japan’s sales revenue has decreased by 20 percent to about $3.5 billion for this year’s second quarter compared with the same period last year, while its “ordinary profits” declined 68 percent to $49.5 million.”The Business Solutions segment reported lower sales compared to the same period last year due to factors such as lackluster demand for business machines and efforts to cut back on printing in office environments,” Haruo Murase, Canon Marketing Japan chairman, said in a statement.

Selling postage meters to small and medium-size businesses in Japan may prove difficult as a result of the advent of e-mail and other technological advances, said Kevin McEvoy, a marketing professor at the University of Connecticut’s Stamford branch.”I see it as a risky strategy because technology has bitten into the postage market dramatically,” he said. “I don’t know if it’s going to work.”Small and medium-size businesses are marketing target.

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August 14, 2009 at 4:01 PM