Marcus Adler has been contracted to spearhead a special project funded by Mutoh Japan.
Adler stated, "Omnitech have been Mutoh’s local agents in the Australia and New Zealand region for 25 years and the time is right to upgrade Mutoh’s operations here."
He joins Omnitech Graphics as a consultant appointed by Mutoh, not as a full time employee and he will manage his own business i-Sign simultaneously. He stated that there should be no problem dealing with his dual rolls as i-Sign now has a strong distribution network who shoulder the lion’s share of the operating workload.
In an interview with Wide Format Online magazine, Marcus Adler, former CEO of Roland DG, said that without a doubt Roland DG was currently the market leader in the under 2.5 metre wide format printer market with Mutoh and Mimaki “probably” holding a similar market share in the number two and three positions.
“My job is to take Mutoh to the number one position and we have set some pretty ambitious targets in order to achieve this”, said Adler.
Mutoh Japan has agreed to jointly fund this special project with Omnitech Graphics in order to help achieve those targets. Adler will report to Mutoh Japan and be accountable for their investment.
When asked if Mutoh Japan was going to enter the Australian and New Zealand market in the same way they have 100% owned operations in other major markets, Adler said no, certainly not at the moment. Not even a joint venture operation (like Roland DG), it would not be appropriate this time as most of our attention and expenditure would then be focused on bureaucratic and administrative changes which would not provide any substantial benefits to our customers or improve sales. So you could call this a kind of pseudo joint venture, with all of benefits and none of the negatives.
He explained it wasn’t simply about advertising more or simply employing more reps in order to bring in more sales, it was about increasing value to the customer with measures such as increasing warranties to five years and warranties that can move with a machine to a new owner when a machine is sold. This has already been implemented by Omnitech Graphics.
Spare parts availability, training and increasing distribution channels as well as consolidating existing distribution channels are also areas where investments will be made.
“Our existing distribution channels with companies such as Fujifilm Sericol, Spandex, Anitech and others, have worked well for us in the past and we will work towards strengthening these channels to offer our customers a far better service starting with a new product and service training program which will coincide with the new product releases planned for Q2 and Q3.
The premises in Silverwater, Sydney are more than adequate for our purposes and by building on our existing dealer network and strengthening our bond with them we see no need to concern ourselves with setting up other branches which would only be a replication of the infrastructure our dealers already have in place.
In direct marketing, he did say that they have already scored a coup by snapping up the sponsorship of the joint ASGA/VISA Conference that will take place later this year in the Hunter Valley.”
Mutoh is an OEM manufacturer of wide format printer engines and supplies engines to several other leading brand names, which includes the company who supplies them with print heads and given their leadership position in the photographic printing field, it would follow that this partnership is working well for both companies.
 |
|
The recently launched ValueJet 1608 Hybrid |
On the question of new product launches, Adler stated that there are several machine upgrade launches in the pipeline to their successful ValueJet range as well as the new ValueJet 1608 Hybrid. All the latest products will be on display at PacPrint at the end of this month.
Asked why Mutoh do not manufacture a combined printer/cutter, Adler stated that for the purpose of label making it has been proven many times that companies that employ separate printers and cutters can operate far more profitably.
Adler stated that Omnitech Graphics have set a target which commits them to doubling their sales in the next twelve months and with the economy improving and forecasts for record sales at PacPrint, we will check back in twelve months to see if they have reached that target.
Omnitech Graphics
http://www.mutoh.com.au/
