Solutions to empower and future-proof SMB IT today – Konica Minolta at HPE Discover 2018

| 27 November 2018

At this year’s event from November 27 to 29 in Madrid, HPE Discover is providing an extraordinary platform for a dialogue tailoring the IT solutions of tomorrow to today. As an IT solution provider putting customers and their needs first, Konica Minolta is proud to be a part of this industry conversation. At the event, Konica Minolta is presenting the results of an exclusive international survey amongst senior IT decision makers in SMBs, quantifying their pain points and key requirements.[1] It provides insights into the challenges SMBs face on a daily basis and the consequential obstacles to integrating new technologies into their systems. With Workplace Hub, Konica Minolta offers a one-stop all-in-one IT platform, helping to transform IT from a mere cost centre into a value-creating business driver. Arne Randt, Lead Product Owner at Konica Minolta, is presenting the insights from the survey and his company’s approach to support SMBs in a speaker note titled: “Helping SMBs meet the challenge of simplifying their IT”.


The research conducted shows that IT departments in SMBs dedicate a large share of their resources to handling IT problems and administration. 56% of their IT budget is eaten up by dealing with IT problems, with their most common IT struggles being hardware that’s not working properly (27%), administrative IT problems (24%), out-of-date software (24%), security risks (23%) and crashing servers (20%). Rather than having to deal with an IT that is under delivering, SMBs would prefer to dedicate their limited resources to actively growing their business (48%) or dealing with the diverse business issues (57%) faced by their companies. 33% of senior IT decision makers rank cyber security as the most significant business challenge, closely followed by increased competition at 27%, with regulation and compliance, talent management and pace of technological change all at 23%.

Workplace Hub is an all-in-one IT system that seamlessly integrates hardware, software and services into a multi-vendor, one-stop solution. It is a scalable IT platform seamlessly configuring systems, devices and software via an intelligent operating system. “With this solution we are able to compose an IT environment which, through seamless integration of legacy systems, fuses a present set-up with the future of IT services, software and hardware in exactly the way our SMB customers require”, he concludes. To architect this solution, Konica Minolta has leveraged Hewlett Packard Enterprise (HPE) ProLiant DL180 Gen10 servers.

Konica Minolta has released Hub and Edge as the first two products from the Workplace Hub portfolio. Hub optimises office space for those who need it, building an IoT infrastructure with servers and software in a space one-metre square. Edge, a solution for those looking to boost performance from their server room, is a managed IT service that can complement existing systems to manage specific operational tasks or replace and manage all IT. Konica Minolta provides IT services to optimise processes for the handling and utilisation of information by offering consultancy, implementation of infrastructure and managed services.

Arne Randt, Lead Product Owner at Konica Minolta, will be holding a speaker note on the topic of “Helping SMBs meet the challenge of simplifying their IT” at the event on Thursday, November 29, at 10.30 am in Theatre 4.

More information: https://www.hpe.com/events/discover/

 

[1] Opinium SME I.T. Pain-point survey for Konica Minolta, 2018

 

About Konica Minolta Business Solutions Europe

Konica Minolta Business Solutions Europe GmbH, based in Langenhagen, Germany, is a wholly owned subsidiary of Konica Minolta Inc., Tokyo, Japan. Konica Minolta enables its clients to champion the digital era: with its unique imaging expertise and data processing capabilities, Konica Minolta creates relevant solutions for its customers and solves issues faced by society. As a provider of comprehensive IT services, Konica Minolta delivers consultancy and services to optimise business processes with workflow automation and implements solutions in the field of IT infrastructure and IT security as well as cloud environments. Konica Minolta was awarded the prestigious “Buyers Lab PaceSetter award for Smart Workplace Vision” from Keypoint Intelligence” as the only vendor in its industry thanks to its forward-looking vision of the future of work and investment in innovative technology. Being a strong partner for the production and industrial printing market, Konica Minolta offers business consulting, state-of-the-art technology and software and, in 2017, was the production printing market leader for the tenth consecutive year in Europe, Central Asia, the Middle East and Africa (InfoSource). The hardware portfolio covers light and mid production as well as industrial printing machines. Konica Minolta Marketing Services provides value added services that intelligently link print and digital marketing in an effective and efficient way. In the healthcare sector, Konica Minolta drives digitalisation of clinical workflows and offers a broad range of next-level diagnostic solutions. Through its Business Innovation Centre in London and four R&D laboratories in Europe, Konica Minolta brings innovation forward by collaborating with its customers as well as academic, industrial and entrepreneurial partners. Konica Minolta Business Solutions Europe is represented by subsidiaries and distributors in more than 80 countries in Europe, Central Asia, the Middle East and Africa. With almost 9,900 employees (as of April 2018), Konica Minolta Europe earned net sales of over EUR 2.37 billion in financial year 2017/18. 

For more information, please visit http://newsroom.konicaminolta.eu/ and follow Konica Minolta on Facebook, YouTube and Twitter @KonicaMinoltaEU.

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