Case studies

Overview: Customer Name Continental Sime Tyre PJ Sdn Bhd The Challenge Need for machines with higher capability and capacity Diverse departments like marketing, engineering and manufacturing require a multi function machine Manual tabulation of cost of printing as well as paper and cartridge usage Unable to track print volume accurately The Solution imageRUNNER imageRUNNER Color UniFLOW Software The Results Cost of printing and print volume can be tabulated and accessible at all time Higher efficiency level due to machine's multiple functions

“We required a system that can monitor all the departments and give us accurate numbers on the quantity of documents printed so we could keep the costs under control,”   Adrian Manager Purchasing- NPM & Investment Continental Sime Tyre PJ Sdn Bhd

Continental Sime Tyre Sdn Bhd is a renowned company when it comes to tyres. Carrying a multi-brand portfolio such as Continental, Dunlop (only available in Malaysia, Singapore and Brunei), Barum, Sime Tyres and Simex, the company has established itself as one of the market leading companies in the tyre industry.

Continental Sime Tyre, a joint venture company between Continental AG of Germany and Sime Darby Berhad, manufactures and markets the tyres across Asia Pacific.

The company has three subsidiaries under its belt - Continental Sime Tyre PJ Sdn Bhd, located in Petaling Jaya and Continental Sime Tyre AS Sdn Bhd located in Alor Star act as its manufacturing base with a total staff strength of 2,600 staff, 1,300 staff in each location; while Continental Sime Tyre Marketing Sdn Bhd acts as its sales and marketing arm.

With escalating business costs, Continental Sime Tyre has to find ways to ensure operational costs are kept to a minimum while enhancing productivity and operational efficiency.

To achieve this, the company started doing an internal audit of its office automation solutions and found three key challenges.

Print Control for a Growing Staff Base with Diverse Needs
First and foremost is the presence of a huge staff base that required prudent copying and printing management on the part of the organization. Also there was a need to provide machines which match various copying and printing needs. The sales & marketing department for instance, require color printing, whereas the engineering department requires sharp image printing in both color and black and white versions. In addition, the engineers also print in different paper sizes.

The administration department, on the other hand, requires only basic printing functionalities.

“To service a growing staff base with diverse needs, our older single function machines were not enough. Too much time was spent on using multiple machines to print, fax, copy and email resulting in loss of productivity," said Mr Adrian Tan, Manager Purchasing - NPM & Investment, Continental Sime Tyre PJ Sdn Bhd.

Printing Cost Control
The second major challenge is to reduce the cost of printing as printing is one of the company's major expenses. While the company has been prudent in managing its costs, Mr Chew Phye Boon, IT Analyst for Continental Sime Tyre said they did not have a mechanism to monitor or control the printing volume.

"Most of our monitoring was generic and based on paper and ink cartridge usage. More so, each department has an independent purchase system which makes things harder. We had to manually count and the information had to be updated manually too," lamented Chew.

Aging Models
Last but not least, having old printing models did not help. Adrian commented, "Basically, the machines we were using were old, so it was time to change. Moreover, these old units did not have any Print Management feature, so we could not track the usage."

"We required a system that can monitor all the departments and give us accurate numbers on the quantity of documents printed so we could keep the costs under control," Adrian added.

Canon imageRUNNER all-in-one solution beat the rest of the competition and won the hearts of the management of Continental Sime Tyre.

"Canon was chosen from a range of competitors as it fulfilled the requirements in line with our company objectives to adopt more cost effective measures," said Adrian.

The company acquired multiple mixtures of Canon's imageRUNNER and image RUNNER Color incorporated with Canon's UniFLOW.

Print Control for a Growing Staff Base with Diverse Needs
With Canon's imageRUNNER solution, Continental Sime Tyre received a multifunction machine that serves all purposes and even allows for easier outgoing message options like faxing from the computer and e-mail through the machine. Even web browsing options are provided to allow instant information dissemination from the imageRUNNER units.

"Our marketing and engineering departments require sharp image color printing for presentation purposes and this is fulfilled by the units from Canon. We have received requests for another color unit from our staff at the engineering department for a smoother work process when comes to printing of drawings in color," enthused Tan.

Printing Cost Control
All Canon machines at Continental Sime Tyre are equipped with Canon's Print Management software to track the usage as well as user information log. This print management software monitors the amount of copies printed by each department and down to each user. The information in turn helps the company monitor its expenses and effect control as and when needed.

Aging Models
The imageRUNNER copiers from Canon with multi-function capabilities replaced the aging units at all departments at the Continental Sime Tyre, The machines allow speedy and smooth copying, printing, faxing, web browsing and e-mail dissemination.