Understanding Utilization
Copier manufacturers may introduce devices that offer more power and more features at or below previous costs from year to year. This strategy creates a powerful incentive for organizations to replace older devices with technology that is similar, yet newer and somewhat enhanced. As a result, organizations may acquire ever-increasing amounts of power without really understanding the true cost associated with their technology decisions.

To fully grasp the price organizations actually pay for the promise of more speed at less cost, it helps to know a bit about how output devices are sold. The fact is that copier manufacturers actually define market segments based on page-per-minute speed. (See Copier Segment Key below.)

According to IDC, Segment 3 and Segment 4 copiers account for about 30 percent of general black-and white office copier placements in the US.1 While these copiers typically support a normal output range of 15,000 to 45,000 pages per month, recent HP data suggests that the average copier in the US actually produces fewer than 8,000 pages per month. In other words, many organizations today may have between two to six times more copying capacity than they actually need.