Ricoh SA is to take on a new, expanded territory and will now be responsible for 23 countries in sub-Saharan Africa.
The global organisation has been restructure to include a new Emerging Markets group, with Ricoh SA now heading up its existing southern African territory but also adding 17 countries in sub-Saharan Africa.
Ricoh SA’s chief operations officer Jacques van Wyk says that numerous reasons underpin South Africa’s choice as a base of sub-Sahara Africa operations including cultural understanding and compatibility, supply chain optimisation, standardised service delivery mechanisms, and localised as well as bespoke African products and services.
“The Ricoh Emerging Markets Group was established as part of our strategy to rapidly expand in the fast-growing emerging markets,” he explains. “We recognise that two-thirds of global growth will stem from these markets.”
Ricoh includes Russia, Turkey and Middle East alongside Africa in its emerging markets group.
Ricoh SA’s portfolio will now include Angola, The Democratic Republic of the Congo (DRC), Zambia, Zimbabwe, Malawi, Tanzania, Rwanda, Burundi, Uganda, Kenya, Mauritius, Madagascar, Seychelles, French Réunion, Union of the Comoros, Mozambique, and the French department of Mayotte.
David Hallas, director of indirect channel operations at Ricoh SA, will lead Ricoh SA’s sub-Sahara African operations as part of his local portfolio. He joined Ricoh SA late last year.
“David has a great deal of experience in the industry,” says Van Wyk. “He was acting MD of Nashua Limited before he joined Ricoh and, prior to that, he earned decades of experience in operations, marketing and sales roles in the document industry. He exhibits the calibre of leadership required to head up a commercially and culturally rich and diverse region as the countries that constitute sub-Sahara Africa and which are so crucial to Ricoh’s future growth prospects.”
Africa is seen as a massive opportunity for Ricoh, which is predicting growth rates of between 22% and 30% for the new region. Van Wyk believes that the focus the company is putting into the region will help to differentiate Ricoh from competitors who may not be placing the same emphasis on growing the market.
Ricoh SA is already working closely with the current business partners in each of the countries and the department that now fall under its expanded territory. These business partners will be certified according to the Business Partner certification programme that Ricoh SA rolled out two years ago in South Africa. That certification programme ranks partners according to a common standard based on their ability to provide, support, and maintain Ricoh products, services and service customer requirements.
“The ability to provide a common standard of service across all of our global regions is a crucial aspect of our service. It ensures we offer a standardised service to our global corporate accounts no matter where they have offices or operations,” says Van Wyk. “For example, a customer of ours is a large retailer with more than 600 stores across Southern Africa. Our standard certification programme ensures that every operational outlet of theirs has access to the same level of service that they get at their head office.”
Business partners will offer the full gamut of Ricoh products and services. These include the eight service lines that consist of application services, business process services, communication services, IT infrastructure services, managed document services (MDS), production printing services, sustainability management services, and workplace services.
Equipment and inventory will be supplied through the Ricoh SA warehouse established at Meadowdale, in Germiston, in South Africa in 2012. This facility is locally staffed and expertly handled by Ricoh Europe Supply Chain.
Ricoh SA will train business partners. This makes it more cost-effective for business partners to train their personnel and minimises the interruption to their operations while personnel are away for shorter periods to receive training.
Rectron distributes Ricoh’s run-rate products in South Africa, and will have the opportunity to continue this relationship in the new territories.
