Ricoh 2009 Annual Report Download - page 15

To Our Shareholders
and Customers
Fiscal 2009
Highlights
Progress of the
16th MTP
Creating New
Customer Value
RICOH
Milestones
Sustainable Environ-
mental Management
Corporate Social
Responsibility
Financial
Section
P r o g r e s s o f t h e 16 t h M i d - T e r m M a n a g e m e n t P l a n
ANNUAL REPORT 2009 14
To Our Shareholders
and Customers
Fiscal 2009
Highlights
Progress of the
16th MTP
Creating New
Customer Value
RICOH
Milestones
Sustainable Environ-
mental Management
Corporate Social
Responsibility
Financial
Section
3) Promoting Ricoh Quality
To become a reliable and attractive global brand, the Ricoh
Group is promoting “Ricoh Quality” as a quality standard for
our products and services. To deliver to our customers excellent
value that will be appreciated by long-time users, we pursue
such quality as expressed in our motto: “a reassuring choice for
purchasers, satisfaction for users, and an impressive experience
for long-standing users.”
Ricoh ranked highest in customer satisfaction with digital
color multifunctional printers for the second consecutive year
in the 2008 Japan Copier/Multifunction Product Customer
Satisfaction Study by J.D. Power Asia Pacifi c. Also, the result of
a survey of compact digital camera customer satisfaction by the
Japan-based ASCII Media Works in March 2009 may exemplify
what Ricoh Quality is. In the survey, our digital camera “GR
Digital” was ranked in fi rst place by a wide margin. Equally or
even more importantly, the respondents’ post-purchase scores
were higher than their at-the-time-of-purchase scores. I think this
kind of recognition will help build an image of unwavering Ricoh
Quality.
4) Creating new growth areas
The IT services and solutions business is another new growth
area in our Imaging and Solutions segment, together with the
production printing business. We provide comprehensive IT-
related support to customers, ranging from connecting MFPs
and printers to networks to the development, operation and
maintenance of IT infrastructures.
In January 2009, Ricoh announced a strategic alliance with
IBM, which has extensive experience in mission critical systems.
Leveraging the combined strengths of Ricoh and IBM, the
alliance intends to provide new solutions services to customers.
The two companies will start their collaboration by launching
Document Security and Management Services (DSMS), which
help customers improve their document workfl ow (i.e., higher
productivity), security and compliance, while reducing the total
cost of ownership (TCO) of offi ce equipment and advancing
environmental sustainability practices. Putting the technologies
and expertise of Ricoh and IBM together, we will provide wide-
ranging services to support customers across the world, where
we not only develop IT infrastructure but also make customers’
problems more visible, and propose, develop, operate, and
maintain IT systems to address these identifi ed problems.
We are also planning to create new businesses outside of the
Imaging and Solutions segment by leveraging our cross-sectional
capabilities across the Group. For this purpose, we intend to
combine Ricoh’s rich advanced technologies that we already
employ in electronic devices, electronic components, and optical
equipment, among other things.
In the thermal media business, we have been promoting
new solutions that combine Ricoh’s original rewritable thermal
paper called RECO-View RF and the RFID system. The solutions
are expected to be introduced in many business fi elds, including
distribution management.
Another new business is our consumer online storage service
“quanp” launched in Japan in May 2008. This new business
is aligned with a key element of Ricoh’s core value: “Support
knowledge management.” The Ricoh Group will continue to
explore new areas of opportunities to help customers’ knowledge
management.
5) Building a strong global brand
With the joining of IKON, the Ricoh Group now has approximately
110,000 employees worldwide. While we have achieved rapid
expansion of our human capital base, some opportunities for
improvement still remain in our organization in terms of effi ciency
and optimization. We will continue ongoing structural reform so
as to become an even leaner enterprise. Moreover, we intend to
make such efforts visible to our customers, which also should
form an important building block of the Ricoh brand. All Ricoh
Group companies and employees, collectively and individually,
will strive to build Ricoh as a strong global brand.
As part of these communication efforts, we installed a
billboard powered solely by natural energy in Times Square, New
York. Going forward, we will continue working to communicate
who we are and what we do through various occasions and
opportunities.
See “RICOH Milestones” on page 19.