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Ink refill just won’t cut it, says Epson
It’s true ink refills are cheaper but they’re inferior in quality as
well.This was the short explanation offered by the local subsidiary of
Epson
Inc. as a response to observations that the “closed” proprietary
cartridge model it has been espousing along with other printer makers
is being challenged with the advent of various ink refilling stations
in the metropolis.
Epson Philippines, through assistant general manager for sales and
marketing Jino Alvarez, said the higher price that consumers fork out
for an original cartridge is reflected in the high quality of ink that
it produces.
He admitted that printer companies like Epson make their profits more
on consumables such as inks rather than sales on printer units
themselves, but he stressed the strict standards in their factories
would assure consumers of clean and high quality products.
This is something which refilling stations do not guaranty or provide,
Alvarez said. “We cannot open up our cartridges to third parties
because we have invested so much on our manufacturing process that we
can’t allow anybody to tinker with the quality of our products.”
The Epson executive also implied that opening up their cartridges to
re-fillers would lessen the incentives for printer companies to keep on
innovating and improving their ink technologies.
Perhaps as a way of illustrating his point, Alvarez said the current
four-color ink combination in its new line of printers is already
capable of photo printing unlike before when it was just limited to
document printing.
“In the past, you need a six-color ink to produce a photo print-out.
Now, you only need a six-color ink if you want your photo to have a
higher quality than that of four-color ink,” said Alvarez, as he led
the launching of new Epson products in Makati City last September 20.
Among those which Epson unveiled for the first time for the Philippine
market are film and photo scanners (Epson Perfection 3590 and 4490),
portable photo printer (PictureMate 100), entry-level printers (Stylus
C67, Stylus C87), and all-in-ones (Stylus CX3700, Stylus CX4100, Stylus
CX4700).
While acknowledging that single-function machines, such as printers,
still dominate the local market, Alvarez said all-in-one machines that
integrate printing, photo-copying, and scanning capabilities are now
also gaining ground.
The Epson official predicted that in two to three years, the market
share of all-in-ones will improve from the current 30 percent to almost
half of the local inkjet market.
This, he said, is expected to replicate the trend in the United States
where, according to an IDC survey, 77 percent of the inkjet market is
made up of all-in-ones.
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