Canon’s 2018 Dealer Summit reinforced the notion that U.S. dealers represent a crucial channel for Canon. Indeed, they have been growing hardware sales at a time that many industry players are struggling to keep up with past years’ numbers. Canon’s global office business is also performing relatively well, which Canon attributes to financial and leadership stability, research and innovation initiatives, and a strong sales network. While Canon’s stated approach in the office print market is to be the last man standing, they are also encouraging dealers to add new offerings to their portfolios—whether those are production print technologies, content management systems that are not dependent on print, and even network surveillance and medical technology down the line.
According to Canon, approximately 127 U.S. dealer reps (from 89 dealerships) were in attendance. While the event, which ran from May 14–16 at the Hilton Orlando Bonnet Creek, occurs annually, this was the first time industry analysts were invited to participate.
An overriding theme of this year’s summit was that Canon is a stable force in a time of industry turmoil—here’s just a sampling of the key findings…
- Canon emphasized the stability of its organization in contrast with competitors experiencing challenges through declining sales, operational uncertainty, and/or downsizing
- As the traditional office print market continues its slow decline, Canon is pushing dealers to become involved with growing markets like wide format, production print, document solutions, and even technology like satellites going forward
- A four-region management system that rebuilds the regional support system for closer communication with dealers and partners
- A new customer solutions center that provides best-in-class end-to-end solutions support
- The expansion of Canon’s solution-capable hardware platform downstream
- The upcoming announcement of high-speed imageRUNNER ADVANCE A4 B&W devices
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