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Lexmark Expands R&D In The Phillippines
By Katlene O. Cacho
Thursday, May 23, 2013LEXMARK is expanding in Cebu in research and development and will continue to hire highly-skilled professionals.The company recently shifted to the mixed hardware-and-software business, following their decision to let go of its inkjet business last year to improve profitability.
“The expansion depends on how the business will go, but we are hiring and expanding in areas such as in research and development (R&D) and shared services operation,” Lexmark Research and Development Corp. (LRDC) president and chief executive officer RL Bandy said yesterday.
Lexmark Cebu employs about 1,800 employees.
The company said “it now brands itself as a provider not just of printing or imaging products and services, but of solutions to help businesses become efficient by staying on top of their masses of structured and unstructured operation.”
Lexmark believes the shift of strategy will allow them to compete in the global market in line with the acceleration of digitization.
“We don’t just print, we provide solutions,” Bandy said, adding that the re-positioning in the market will provide access to solutions to accelerate work
productivity especially for small- and medium-sized companies.““What we do is help companies streamline and grow their businesses and help them save money on their printing,” he said.
Bandy said Cebu’s operation will now focus on content, process and output management.
To facilitate this new role in the market, Bandy said the company has acquired eight software companies to drive the new strategy along with their hardware solutions.
The acquisition began since May 2010 with Perceptive Software, a Kansas-based software firm that develops enterprise content management, business process management and document output management applications.
A year after, the company acquired Pallas Athena that is based in Netherlands. Last year, the company bought three software companies BDGB Enterprise, ISYS Search Software and Nolij Corp and early this year, it acquired Acuo Technologies, Twistage and Access Via.
“(The acquisition) implies that as the business is shifting its strategy and focus, there are new, unique competences developed here,” the firm said.
Meanwhile, Christophe Calligaro, director of Lexmark Cebu Shared Service Center, clarified that their shared services operation here is more than just a call center.
He noted that although they have a technical support center, this only makes up 20 percent of the company’s activity. Bulk of the activities include supply chain, accounting, finance, and sales and marketing.
“We are not a BPO, we are doing R&D and other types of activities, and we need to clarify that we are not just a call center,” Calligaro stressed.
Given the boom in the outsourcing industry, Calligaro believes the future lies in generating jobs that would bring value-added type of activities.
“It’s true that it’s good for the Philippines, because it attracts companies but this is a competitive market. The Philippines has to stay ahead to keep jobs here,” he
said.Yesterday, the company opened its R&D and shared service facilities to their partners from the academe, private organizations and the government.
Published in the Sun.Star Cebu newspaper on May 24, 2013.
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