Fax Featured Article

Ricoh (News - Alert) Americas Corporation, a provider of document management systems including fax and printers, announced the launch of a new range of multifunction products (MFPs).

Built on the company’s new platform, the MFPs provide seamless interfacing with the Web, cloud services and a wide range of applications that help solve customer business problems and generate true business value.

"We've created a new generation of intelligent MFPs with a workstation-class computing platform inside and an interface that focuses that power on each individual's most important work," said Mike Dane, vice president, Marketing, for Ricoh Americas Corporation, in a statement.

MFP, according to Dane, has become a full-fledged, two-way engine of the corporate information ecosystem, providing a robust portal for users to input, process and output information. “Its new applications empower today's workplace where, among other things, workers are increasingly mobile and bringing their own device into the work environment."

Ricoh's New Technology (News - Alert) Platform incorporates new capabilities designed to help improve workflow, cost of ownership, sustainability, security, compliance and accessibility. A Customizable User Interface features a full-color touchscreen operating panel customizable for each department, workgroup or user's workflow.

Thanks to the built-in MFP web browser, users can navigate and print from the web, and allow for access to cloud services, including applications for document capture, management, storage, processing (e.g., OCR), printing, sharing, customer relationship management and more.

Another aspect of the platform is the Mobile Printing which incorporates wireless mobile printing capabilities for users of all the standard smart phones and tablets. The new platform fully supports the bring-your-own-device (BYOD) culture.

The MFPs also feature eco-friendly indicator displays, by user or organization, key metrics to stimulate environmentally (and financially) responsible resource use.  The new security options offer a long list of industry-leading security technologies including unauthorized copy control which helps secure copying of confidential documents.

Another security feature is the stronger (256-bit) address book/job encryption and a data overwrite system that lets administrators destroy all stored data when an MFP changes hands. The MFPs also feature Bates stamping, which enables legal, medical, insurance, financial and other workers to scan enterprise documents into file management systems using sequential numbering schemes.  

Recent technology boosts like fax server and the multifunction copier have revolutionized faxing in offices.

The Fax Guys, for example, represents a fax software product that uses the Internet to send faxes, but charges $20,000 for a one-time license, then $4,000 per year for maintenance of a fax server that can send 4,000 messages in one eight hour day, according to a recent TMCnet report. Read the full article here.