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Inkjet Printers

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PCQ Bureau
New Update
Year Winner
2000 HP
1999 HP
1998 HP
1997 HP
1996 HP
1995 HP
1994 HP
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We’ve seen healthy competition in inkjet printers this

year, with five contenders making it to the User’s Choice Club. HP continues

its hold on mindshare for the seventh year in a row. Epson remains second for

the second consecutive year. Canon has crept up the rankings a bit, while Apollo

and Lexmark managed to make a mark.

Where currently favored brands are concerned, most

respondents in households and establishments use HP inkjet printers again. Epson

is a distant second too, followed by the rest. However, competition in this

segment is very strong, causing printer manufacturers to add innovative

features, and fight fierce marketing battles.

Inkjet Printers

User's Choice Club  UPI
HP 100
Epson 30
Canon 11
Wipro-Apollo 7
TVSE-Lexmark 7
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Users have indicated quality as their prime criterion for

choosing a brand. Speaking of quality, one innovation added to printers was

photo-quality printouts. The prime method was to add an extra color ink

cartridge to the printer for this purpose. In fact, there’s been fierce

competition in photo-quality inkjets–giving consumers the advantage of getting

good quality at a decent price.

HP is particularly strong in the south as the preferred

brand. As before, Epson is the next most preferred, but its mindshare in the

north appears quite weak.

The biggest disadvantage of inkjet printers has been their

high running costs. To counter this, all printer companies are also making a

huge noise about the ink-saving features in their printers–software controls

to let you find out the levels of ink in the cartridge, separate cartridges for

each color, and so on. Most companies are making serious efforts to ensure that

users only buy genuine cartridges. Epson has cut down its cartridge prices and

has special packs for India. HP bundles free cartridges with different printers

and has also tied up with Kendriya Bhandar, so that genuine cartridges are

available at steady prices.

What happens next in this highly competitive market? Prices have come to bare

minimum levels, and innovative features have been added like there’s no

tomorrow. The future seems quite interesting, let’s see what

"prints" next year.

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