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HVTO Q&A:
Peter Grant
Research Vice President
Gartner

Peter Grant is a research vice president at Gartner, where he is responsible for printer markets and management. He also focuses on office products, including printers, copiers, multifunction products and emerging technologies. Grant's research includes output fleet management, output outsourcing services and printer TCO.

Peter Grant will be a presenter at the upcoming Gartner Print & Imaging Summit, Dec. 2 – 4, 2007.

Question:
Tell us about your role at Gartner.

Answer:
My role is to manage our worldwide team of print analysts. I have the opportunity to make sure our research agenda is providing the content and insight that helps our clients make the best decisions about print.

Question:
In your work at Gartner, what industry trends are you paying attention to the most and why?

Answer:
We are watching the trend from monochrome to color in both the office and production print. Color has inherent challenges regarding higher costs that are not clearly understood. Our clients rely on us to help them strategize a way to include color with out loosing control of costs.

Managed Print Services (MPS) is gaining interest around the world. MPS is very broadly defined to include copier click charges to full outsourced print environment. Our client need help understanding what is best for their business.

Question:
What are your looking forward to at this year’s Gartner Print & Imaging Summit?

Answer:
I look forward to the one on one meetings with our client s to have confidential discussions of their unique print challenges.

Question:
What will your message be to attendees at this year’s event?

Answer:
I will help our print customers understand the value of Gartner’s 800 analysts as it relates to their top concerns around print. We understand print from the top down and bottom up perspectives.  Our recommendations have been peer reviewed by some of the best analysts in the industry.

Question:
Why is the Gartner Print & Imaging Summit a can’t-miss event for technology users?

Answer:
No where else can end users of print find the insight and get the answers they need to save money and improve productivity around documents. 

Question:
What’s your best advice for today’s professional?

Answer:
Stop thinking about print procurement as an activity done every five years or when they break.  Get the right person managing your consolidated print environment as a process and capture the savings we know exist.

Question:
Thanks for your time! Last question. Last year at the Summit you encouraged companies to initiate a print strategy to be successful. What do you encourage them to do this year to be successful?

Answer:
Now that the print initiative is started you need to have quarterly or half-yearly reviews on how you are managing to your metrics. Are you achieving your goals of lowering spend? Fewer pages printed. Fewer print devices deployed, etc.? If you are not doing this periodic review then you may be slipping back out of control.

To learn more about the Gartner Print & Imaging Summit, click here.