Distributor has high ambitions for printer market

Specialist printer distributor CIE Pacific last week announced its appointment as a Kyocera distributor, the latest in a raft of agreements the Siltek group member has signed over the preceding couple of months.

CIE will offer Kyocera's entire range of products through its existing 10,000- strong reseller channel.

`We have been known for our high-end specialty while Kyocera are more renowned for their low-end offerings. But we wanted to offer complete solutions for printers so we needed to convert our resellers to Kyocera as well,' said Michael Rebiffe, general manager of CIE Pacific.

Kyocera's channel will also see some of the action with Rebiffe planning to distribute CIE's whole range of printer products through them as well as its own channel. This includes pitching the merits of C.Itoh and Genicom as the other brands it stocks.

However Rebiffe is quick to reassure Kyocera's existing distributors that its intentions are honourable in that its sales strategy is to expand Kyocera's overall presence in the printer market rather than muscle in on their current business.

`That would be stupid, like biting the hand that feeds you from Kyocera's point of view. Instead we want to pick up Kyocera's current 8 per cent of the laser printer market to about a quarter to a half of this segment,' explained Rebiffe.

C.Itoh and Genicom are also both relatively new CIE partners, with Genicom and Kyocera arrangements focused on Australia and CIE establishing C.Itoh locally before eventually moving into the Asia-Pacific region.

Rebiffe has expansion plans for them as well, predicting that through C.Itoh, CIE can control about 5 per cent of the colour printer market. Similarly, he said Genicom products would allow CIE to dominate 40 per cent of the line printer range and 100 per cent of the travel ticket printer market.

To achieve these ambitious goals CIE reseller partners will be signed on as members of the distributors `CIE Club' program, which includes the Loyalty Bonus program, and requires them to commit to selling $50,000 worth of Kyocera printers annually.

In return CIE promises technical support, lead generation, preferred dealer prices and financial services.

`For large bids and tenders, resellers might have the technical expertise but they won't have the products or financial capital. We can extend their credit limit in those cases,' explained Rebiffe.

`We're getting away from the usual 4 to 5 per cent margins and getting into double digits,' he added.

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