Canadian value-added resellers (VARs) and other channel partners can now get their hands on HP Inc.’s LaserJet 400 series printers, including the just launched A4 model, through D&H Distributing.
Announced last week, D&H Canada said the new agreement with HP also includes the LaserJet 100/200 series, as well as company’s PageWide printers. The A4 400 LaserJets use HP’s EcoSmart black toner and consume an average 21 per cent less energy than HP’s previous printers, but the biggest draw for these printers among VARs will be their embedded security features, according to Roy Rivers, vice-president of sales for D&H Canada.
“With cloud and BYOB, security has become important to businesses of all sizes,” he said. “And with smaller businesses getting hit with ransomware more and more, you’re going to need to bring on products that can be part of a more proactive security strategy.”
Printers are often easy attack surfaces for hackers to target, indicated Rivers. The security in HP products is hard to beat, he added, and HP wants D&H to take its printers directly to the often over-looked small businesses that need every edge they can get to combat ransomware. The managed print and document services and basic print services market was $38.4 billion in 2017, and IDC projects that by 2022, it will grow to $49.9 billion.
The news about HP’s new printers making their way into the distributors lineup of products came during D&H’s 2019 Toronto Technology Roadshow, where more than 35 manufacturers were present.
Product pitches are still part of many conversations at the show, but there was a noticeable difference this time around, said Rivers. The words “solutions”, “services”, and “Everything-as-a-Service” were uttered a lot more this time around, and it represents the distributor’s personal shift in that direction.
“It’s hard to do that in the SMB space especially with our heritage, but that’s where we’re going,” he said.
D&H Canada’s white-labeled managed services offerings, announced back in July, are slowly gaining traction among customers, said Rivers.
“We’re heading towards $100,000 in opportunities, but they’re slower to close,” he explained. “The services are new to a lot of partners who are bringing them to their customers and it’s a much longer sales cycle. It’s different than simply going ‘here’s your price and here’s your product.’ But there’s a lot of interest and a growing pipeline.”