COVID-19 has accelerated digital transformation for most companies. However, one area that is often overlooked is print services, despite the fact that print services offer many different ways to improve productivity. Moving to the cloud for print services can help businesses set themselves up for a strong recovery as the immediate threat posed by COVID-19 starts to recede and the new modern workplace is revealed.
If COVID-19 had hit the workforce before the cloud was widely adopted, it would have been almost impossible for businesses to pivot to distributed and remote working models as quickly and effectively as they did. However, with such a high proportion of Australian businesses using cloud-based applications already, the transition to remote working was generally successful. Using cloud services, workers could access company systems and data, remaining as productive from home as they would have been in the office, if not even more so.
Cloud can also be a gamechanger when it comes to print services. In late 2019, before the impacts of COVID-19 were fully apparent, Quocirca’s Global Print 2025 second edition report revealed that almost three-quarters of the respondents expected to see growth in cloud adoption.
Print services can provide significant benefits in terms of addressing cost and efficiency issues for businesses. For example, mobile printing is simpler and more streamlined, which is important as workers increasingly need the ability to print from any device, at any location.
This need is brought into even sharper relief when considering the complexities of returning to office-based work. Some workers will move between offices or only be able to visit offices on their designated day. Print services can avoid situations where users are locked into using specific printers, which can cause backlogs and delays, instead, letting them print flexibly.
Print services can automate manual workflows and processes, saving time and making workers more productive. When digitalised documents are saved in cloud-based databases rather than on-premise infrastructure, they are easier to access and work with for remote workers.
Cloud-based print services can deliver all of these benefits along with significant savings on infrastructure and maintenance costs. And, when provided via a flexible pricing model, such as a simple per-device subscription fee, it also provides a simple and transparent cost structure.
The benefits of cloud-based print services come in part because this model removes responsibility for managing printing on-premise or at a private data centre. The organisation must maintain the print infrastructure in those cases, creating a burden in terms of both cost and time. Ideally, businesses should pass that burden off to external providers where possible. This frees up both capital and cash flow, and lets in-house resources focus on areas where they can add more value.
The ideal approach is a shared infrastructure approach with cloud-based print infrastructure provider. With a shared infrastructure, multiple users can share the same infrastructure, which also means they share the costs, making it more affordable. This is important for businesses looking to manage their resources carefully.
Using edge computing in conjunction with cloud-based print services, businesses can enjoy a print environment in which job processing is done at the on-premise printing device with no maintenance required on the business’s part. It’s managed from the cloud with only metadata stored for reporting purposes.
This approach is ideal when security and privacy are strong concerns, because jobs are processed locally, so sensitive information doesn’t get uploaded to the cloud. And, because only metadata goes into the cloud, this approach works well when connectivity is unreliable or bandwidth is limited.
As SMEs prepare for the future of work in a post-COVID-19 landscape, they must consider solutions that streamline processes, reduce costs, and let people be productive from any location. Cloud-based print services can strongly position organisations for a successful rebound following COVID-19.
Hyder Mohammad, lead enterprise architect, Y Soft
