Canon Group
Close Close
Menu Menu Close Close Search

How To Future Proof Your Business

Canon provides solutions to aid digital transformation, support new ways of working and help your business thrive in challenging times.

Keeping up with the ever-changing digital age can be daunting. Executives around the world are continually striving to improve their operations so they can match or even better the rate at which competitors are transforming their processes, organisation, and customer relationships to meet market requirements. Many are embracing digital transformation, the new way of working that transcends traditional and outdated business practices.

Innovation and technology underpin digital transformation, allowing companies to compete, differentiate, and outperform one another.

Covid-19 has disrupted traditional ways of working, forcing businesses to be adaptable in their ability to work remotely. This has become a key motivator in turning discussions on digital transformation into immediate action. What can companies do to move now and move fast? A Forbes article titled ‘Post Covid-19, the answer is digital transformation, now what’s the question?’ lists the first five keys to digital transformation:

  •   Create a digital thread right at the start of the innovation process and maintain it to the end of the product life.
  •   Find manufacturing partners that are digitally native and will enable the choice, agility and resilience you need
  •   Ensure you have the right digital tools to manage your supply chain. (It’s time to throw away those spreadsheets)
  •   Insist that your own manufacturing ecosystem or that of any supplier has implemented a digital transformation strategy
  •   Embrace the digital twin, automation, robotics, additive manufacturing and artificial intelligence as technology building blocks
 

With many businesses in need of support during these rapid changes, Canon is providing solutions to aid digital transformation and support new ways of working, as spelled out below.

Modern businesses today run meetings with a combination of people who might be out in the field, in the office or working from home

Enabling each participant to see what is being presented or shared, contribute to the discussion and clearly hear people is important in order to deliver the best experience possible and to enable maximum productivity. This can be achieved by the use of an interactive display such as the InFocus Mondopad, which is a powerful collaboration tool in the virtual meeting room space. This cloud-based platform supports a wide range of video-conference systems, functions as a digital whiteboard, and can connect to any Microsoft office or Google account, allowing you to share data anytime, anywhere – all from one seamlessly integrated platform.

Capture accurate information for every visitor on site, integrate with a directory and instantly send messages in emergency situations

Commercial-grade touch-screen visitor kiosks are being successfully deployed by companies every day, giving more control over the choice of product or service on offer.

Such kiosks are used for a variety of business purposes, ranging from visitor registration, product displays and way finders, to ecommerce and payment solutions. Paired with a visitor-management software program that is easy to use, the kiosks provide accurate contact-tracing details for every visitor, and can even enable zero-touch sign-in and sign-out from a smartphone with an optional barcode reader.

From home or on the go, give staff the ability to print, scan and access documents as easily as if they were working in the office

Remote workers may have a laptop but not the ability to scan or print off-site, impacting the time to process documents and vital information. Using Canon’s uniFLOW Online print management platform lets businesses connect the printers of their home-based workers to the corporate network, enabling staff to print and scan as if they were in the office. Employees working from home can print directly from their device, with immediate job release, while the business can still report and track print-related costs. Portable scanners enable mobile workers to print and scan documents on the go.

Keep staff, visitors, students, and the wider community informed with real-time updates

Emails are often ignored, and posters are out of date as fast as you can print them. Positioning digital signage in highly visible areas can be an efficient and effective way to communicate important messaging in an instant, capturing 400 percent more views than static displays. Examples of such areas include a reception space or foyer, an externally facing glass window or the side of a building. Content is managed by cloud-based software, to provide complete control over what is displayed, on one or multiple screens. Users can livestream traffic or weather updates or screen the latest dynamic, targeted content quickly and easily.

Achieve continuity in mailrooms around document delivery and package-handling

Setting up a digital mailroom can future-proof critical business operations and minimises the risk of disrupting everything from invoicing workflows, to cheque processing, to the completion of confidential forms and applications. The benefits of establishing a digital mailroom in the midst of a global pandemic include cost savings on commercial real estate, access to a secure online web browser-based solution, eliminating paper, and reducing manual mail-handling. Launching such services in today’s disrupted work environment may seem daunting, but businesses can begin slowly, with something as simple as mail digitisation. Then, in future, they can look to build on that solution in order to further improve the return on expenditure through a phased investment approach.

We haven’t looked back since engaging a digital mail service and we now see it as an integral part of our head office administration processes. The service provided by Canon has been reliable and was easily integrated into our existing mail distribution process. Ease of communication with the Canon team has meant any day to day queries are responded to quickly and effectively. During this time of uncertainty, it is reassuring to know that our head office mail team can continue to function effectively even during Level 3 and 4 lockdowns.

Deborah Chapman - Office Manager, Ryman Healthcare Limited

Hire a virtual workforce of robots to effortlessly automate your repetitive business processes

Robotic Process Automation (RPA) allows you to double down on the high-value work that can’t be automated, like exception management and strategic decision-making, by providing the ability to outsource the point-and-click tasks that shouldn’t require human involvement.

RPA-as-a-service allows you to add highly effective digital workers to your workforce without the usual set-up costs and commitments. Automate any manual workflow with technology that mimics human functions, including order management, customer service, accounting, and data compilation.

Gain total control of your important business documents

Imagine if all your paper-based records were secure and accessible online at any time. You would free your employees from manual tasks, improve workflow, and save your business money. Document processing includes high-volume scanning and form automation, industry-specific application processing and reliable claims processing. Digital transformation and document services will streamline your business, delivering improved information flow, communication and potential cost savings.

Spend less time managing your business information and bring greater productivity to your enterprise

In order to make the right decisions in a timely manner, a business needs to have all information available and easily accessible. Digital transformation allows you to securely store your documents in any format and to search for them by customer name, customer number, invoice number or date. This reduces the time it takes to access the documents and solve customer queries, and cuts your stationery, postage and printing costs. The solution delivers a completely secure scanning, indexing, archival and retrieval system for a wide range of digital documents and it is entirely customisable.

Enhance tools that classify, manage and handle every business exception with workflow and exception-management solutions

Managing routine workflows to prevent errors and exceptions is a mundane and time-consuming task that could easily be done though automation. There are always exceptions to the rule; Canon’s workflow and exception-management solution is designed to streamline the handling of these cases through automation. Save time correcting the errors brought to your attention by exporting your document enabling first- and subsequent-level routing for resolution. Canon’s team can handle your first-level exceptions, so you can deal only with business-critical cases and concentrate on your core business activity.

Manage the ‘procure to pay’ process, from order to payment, through automated accounts payable

Financial functions can be costly and inefficient for businesses to manage internally. Eliminate the labour-intensive process of identifying, matching and approving hard-copy invoices and achieve faster and more precise invoice processing with an automated accounts-payable solution. This covers the entire purchasing process, from the initial order through to the final invoice payment, and converts invoices into a digital format that can be imported into your financial system.

Eliminate the need for costly line-level scanning with electronic invoicing

Make things easy for your suppliers and your finance team. Electronic invoicing eliminates the need for costly line-level scanning by using Optical Character Recognition (OCR) extraction and validation. It's easy to implement and does not require the supplier to change the way they invoice you, thus removing barriers to suppliers coming on board. Canon’s InvoiceMe software is a comprehensive electronic invoicing solution, offering suppliers the convenience of lodging their invoices electronically via their preferred accounting software. It’s compatible with a wide range of products and requires no new software.

Long-lasting, high-impact digital transformation requires an acute knowledge of the people, processes, and systems that make up your organisation. Successful digital transformation requires an understanding of how your tangible assets – equipment, machinery, and facilities – operate to deliver value.

Canon and Converga have more than 25 years’ experience in New Zealand. Canon acquired Converga in 2015 and together, they present a powerful combination of capability to deliver solutions to enable digital transformation to clients under a single business entity.

Fill in your details below to download the full ebook to find out more about what the Future Workplace looks like in 2020 and beyond with Robotic Process Automation.

Download the RPA eBook
Follow us on
Related Articles
  • icon-Send-Enquiry

    Send an Enquiry

    Email our customer support team

    Send an enquiry
  • Icon-Contact-Chat

    Call 0800 222 666

    For customer service and sales enquiries just give us a call from within New Zealand 

    (8.30am to 5pm, Monday - Friday)