The following appears on TheImagingChannel.com

by Patricia Ames – In Arizona at the end of March, Samsung Printer Group held what may be their last national dealer meeting. Despite what could be described as a “fluid situation,” both Samsung and HP executives did a noteworthy job of outlining as much detail as possible about the impending transition while also maintaining an air of transparency — no small task given the large undertaking now in full swing and the level of anxiety of some of the dealers in the room.

We’ve written extensively about HP’s moves in the A3 space here and here, so I thought I would focus on the message Samsung executives were delivering, at least until we get to the end of this blog.

Matt Smith, VP Printing Solutions at Samsung Americas, kicked off the event by detailing the “wins” for 2016. Smith painted a picture of excellent growth overall for the Samsung Printer Group, not only in number of new dealers, but also revenue, margin and units placed in both A3 and A4 segments, as well as an increase in enterprise sales. Smith believes that the addition of the MX7, with speeds of up to 60 ppm, to the lineup has really allowed dealers to sell and have confidence in a full line of products — and that has directly influenced growth. Add to this equation what Samsung considers a key differentiator in the market – the Smart UX platform – and now there is the ability for dealers to flip the conversation from talking CPP to talking productivity gain. And that, Smith believes, is the key to more enterprise sales.