Digital BW, The Print

On Feb 24, 2009, at 1:24 PM, Greg wrote:

> I've kind of been waiting for this to happen, and now it has been
> confirmed. The guys at Colorvision are going to have a good time with
> this little tidbit.

Its a tough economy, and we are all trying to find the best way to  
continue to be viable, and meet users needs. At Datacolor, for  
example, we have chosen to discontinue phone support, as our web-based  
ticket system provided the best results, as well as being more cost  
effective and more flexible. This will cause dissatisfaction from a  
few customers, who want a real person to talk to (maybe even shout  
at), right this minute, but those who want real answers to technical  
issues will understand that the support system was always the  
practical route to advanced assistance.

 From my perspective: X-Rite made a couple of daring acquisitions  
right before the market changed, and as a result has had to make some  
pretty radical changes and reductions, first to eliminate the  
redundancy caused by the mergers, then to deal with the current  
recession and drop in sales, which required refinancing to service  
their rather extensive debt. Our company looked carefully at the same  
possible acquisitions at the time, and chose to pass on both of them,  
which left us debt-free and cash positive. At the moment that  
certainly seems like the right answer, but only time will tell.

The other factor is that our Digital Imaging division has continued to  
sell product at about the same rate as last year, so we can continue  
to offer service, since we have not seen a drop in sales. If the  
circumstances were different, we might be significantly reducing  
intangibles as well. I had too many friends in a number of countries  
at (I have to take a deep breath to type up this long list): Logo,  
Gretag Macbeth, Monaco, Sequel, Pantone, and X-Rite to make light of  
the current difficulties of the combined organization, or that of the  
rest of the world economy, for that matter.

As for the Spectrolino, it was the standard for our industry for many  
years... but that was quite a while ago. We certainly are not offering  
continuing support for products that have been off the market that  
long; though of course our products are not designed for recalibration  
and repair, quite the way a Spectrolino was; given its higher price  
point. So, if you expect me to make fun of X-Rite on a product, don't  
choose Spectrolino support; I'd suggest ColorMunki sales instead... ; )

C. David Tobie
Global Product Technology Manager
Digital Imaging & Home Theater
CDTobie@...


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Datacolor
www.datacolor.com/Spyder3




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