Print.IT Reseller
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channel partners
Scanning, OCR and data capture
specialist I.R.I.S. plans to increase
its presence in the UK by recruiting
more resellers and strengthening its
links with retailers.
At the company’s IRISLink 2014
conference (covered in greater detail in the
next issue), Thierry Desmet, sales manager
export, I.R.I.S. told
PrintIT Reseller
that sales
were weaker in the UK than they should
be and that his main focus for 2014 was to
increase the number of retailer and reseller
partners on this side of the Channel.
“If we increase our profile, we can do
10 times more business than today. The
opportunity in the UK is huge,” he said.
Data capture
I.R.I.S., acquired by Canon last year but still
run as an independent company, provides
solutions and services that enable users
to capture data from all sources (paper,
email, software applications, PDF, fax etc.)
and make it usable in digital processes and
other applications
It has two divisions: Product &
Technologies, sold through OEM
relationships, VARs, resellers, retailers and
e-tailers; and Professional Services, such as
digital mailroom, document management,
business process outsourcing and IT
services, which I.R.I.S. provides to more
than 1,100 large accounts.
The Product & Technologies portfolio
encompasses hardware – handheld,
portable, pen and business card scanners
and digital note takers that automatically
capture handwritten notes – and software
solutions.
These include optical character
recognition (Readiris); PDF creation and
compression (IRISCompressor); and a
variety of document capture, classification
and data extraction solutions (IRISCapture
Invoices for processing supplier invoices,
IRISDocument Server for converting archived
images and PDF files into searchable,
structured and compressed documents; IRIS
Powerscan for production scanning and
OCR; and IRISConnect for integration with
third party solutions and the cloud).
I.R.I.S. has you
in its sights
I.R.I.S., the OCR software and portable scanner specialist, now part of
the Canon Group, plans to recruit more channel partners to raise its
profile in the UK
Impulse buys
Desmet said that products such as these
are often impulse buys, which is why it
is vital for I.R.I.S. to increase its retail
presence and expand its reseller base from
the 50 it already has.
“These products cost in the region of
£50-£70. That’s the kind of sum that’s
difficult to find in areas that have financial
difficulties. In the UK, people have the money
but don’t see the products. Our presence
needs to be increased massively,” he said.
He adds that portable and handheld
scanners represent the future of scanning
and are a growing market with great
potential for the channel.
“The future of home scanning is
handheld scanners. That is the way people
will go in the future. They will quit flatbed
scanners because they take up a lot of
space on the desk. They will replace them
with small devices, a mouse or an app – we
will have big announcements in this area in
2014. This is the direction in which we are
moving: cloud applications and handheld
scanners that you can carry with you.”
Business solutions
Later this year, I.R.I.S. will be launching
new business-oriented products that
combine scanner hardware and I.R.I.S.
software, giving resellers a complete
business solution for small and medium-
sized businesses.
Desmet said: “We want to increase
business that adds value and will have
good news in 2014, probably in Q3. The
product is almost final, so it could be
sooner. In a first for I.R.I.S., we will deliver
it with an SMB application inside the box.”
In addition to retail products, I.R.I.S.
provides a wide range of professional
solutions that enable organisations to
improve their business processes and
workflows. These are available as on premise
or cloud-based offerings and can be fully
integrated with MFPs, as well as scanners
(covered in more detail in the next issue).
Last year, I.R.I.S. increased revenue
from solutions sold by Canon by more than
60%. This gives some indication of the
potential that exists for other resellers to
increase sales.
To find out more about what I.R.I.S. has
to offer UK channel partners, please email
or
call
+32 (0)10 832 467
.
If we increase
our profile,
we can do
10 time more
business...
Handheld scanners
One of Desmet’s big priorities
this year is to increase sales of I.R.I.S.
handheld scanners, including:
n
the new portable IRIScan Anywhere 3
WiFi, which enables users to scan on
the go and instantly transfer images to
a mobile, tablet or laptop;
n
the new version of IRIS’s pen scanner
(the IRISPen Executive 7), a category
which I.R.I.S. invented in 1994 and in
which it has notched up sales of more
than 500,000 units so far; and
n
the IRIScan Mouse, which is now
compatible with Macs as well as PCs.
The IRIScan Mouse is a fully functioning
mouse that also incorporates a scan
button that when pressed lets you scan
documents, photos, receipts, business
cards, newspapers etc. up to A3 size
by swiping the mouse across the
page. Scanned images can be
OCR’d, edited, compressed,
saved and dragged and
dropped into other
applications or the
cloud. I.R.I.S. launched
the first version last year
and has already sold 50,000 units.
IRISPen
Executive 7
