HP Canon & Epson Ink, Lexmark, Brother Toner cartridge Printer Ink Cartridges News

Today (Tuesday 21st Oct), Lexmark announced their financial results for the third quarter of 2008.Third Quarter revenue was $1.13Billion down 5 percent compared to last year.

Paul Curlander (Lexmark Chairman and CEO) said “Although we encountered increasing economic weakness during the third quarter, our results were in line with our expectations at the beginning of the quarter, with good growth in our branded laser units and laser supplies, an improved performance in our US laser business, strong growth in laser multifunction devices, and an ongoing R&D investment that resulted in the introduction of 38 new laser products yesterday”. he added “as we look forward, despite a more difficult global economic environment, we expect to continue to make progress with our strategy to improve our focus and penetration in the higher usage market segments.  Our strong balance sheet and good liquidity, with more than $1Billion in cash and marketable securities, and a long track record of good cash generation positions us well to invest in the future and to compete effectively, even during challenging time”.

The Company ended the quarter with $1.086 Billion in cash and current marketable securities.  Third quarter net cash provided by operating activities was $117 million.

This all sounds like good business sense to me, it is easier to spend than to accumulate cash and profits

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Lexmark International will announce one of its largest product launches in its history on Monday morning.

The launch of 38 models of laser printers comes in advance of Tuesday’s third-quarter earnings announcement.

Among the new lineup is the company’s next generation of colour laser printers that it boasts are the smallest in their product classes.

It also is starting a customer rewards program for the new line of colour lasers. It is similar to one that had been in place for inkjet printers. And it’s guaranteeing customers that it won’t raise the price of that colour toner during the products’ lifetimes.

The lineups include new colour laser single-function and multi-function printers that can scan, copy and fax.

The company is hoping the smaller size and lower prices of the new colour laser lineup will persuade companies to ditch leased copiers in favour of Lexmark products.

The Lexmark Rewards Program is being extended to the colour laser C540 and X540 model series.

Under the program, once customers buy and return 10 of any cartridges for those models, they’ll receive their choice of a free cartridge that prints the most pages of any type sold.

The company’s also releasing new lines of its single and multi-function black and white printers, as well as a new E series of smaller black and white printers.

“It’s unusual for us to have so many launch at once,” said Keith Jones, vice president of worldwide marketing for the company’s laser printer division. “It’s just the way it worked out.”

Among some of the added features to the new T, E, X54xe and X65xe families of printers are increased print speeds, cartridges that print more pages and wireless options on some.

The company also expanded its “eco-mode,” which reduces power consumption, and quiet mode from the previous E series line to the entire lineup.

The E series also saw its printer engines tweaked for improved print quality, Jones said.

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In conjunction with its second-quarter earnings announcement on Tuesday, Lexmark International said it will close another of its inkjet cartridge-manufacturing plants in Mexico.

The move, which will cost the company about $24 million before taxes, will affect about 650 jobs. The company estimates most of the jobs at the Chihuahua, Mexico, plant will be moved to a lower-cost country. The company continues to operate a plant in Juarez, Mexico, where it closed one of two plants last year. It also has a plant in Lapu-Lapu City in the Philippines.

The closure is expected to save the company about $9 million annually beginning in 2009.

The goal is to improve the company’s struggling inkjet division, which has dragged on the health of the company since the latter half of 2005 and continues to weigh down earnings, as evidenced in Tuesday’s announcement.

Earnings for the second quarter included a 6 percent revenue drop but exceeded analysts’ expectations. That revenue drop was linked to the inkjet division, which sold 49 percent fewer printers in the quarter than in the same period a year earlier.

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We often get people enquiring whether we stock the Lexmark No 2 Tri Colour ink cartridge, but unfortunately we can’t actually buy them from our suppliers because they go into a range of printers that are only available through Dixons Stores Group (DSG) which include PC-World, Dixons, Currys and PCWorld.com, and due to the deal that Lexmark have with DSG we are not allowed to sell the ink cartridges for that printer.

This cartridge goes into the following Lexmark (Exclusive to DSG) printers:

• Z738
• Z1380
• Z1480
• X2480
• X2580
• X3480
• X3580
• X4580

However, we have just taken supplies of refilled No 2 cartridges and now have them available in stock.  The refilled cartridge is only £13.49 including VAT and FREE First class post delivery compared to the Lexmark original on the PCWorld website which is £17.99 + £4.95 standard delivery (whatever that means) which is an eye watering total of £22.94 - which makes us NINE quid cheaper!!!

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Unusually these days, when it seems that Boardroom Emoluments are unaffected by the performance of the company for which that Boardroom is responsible, Lexmark executives have had their Bonuses slashed, reflecting the fall in the companies share price over the past 12 months.

In a Proxy statement released by the company this week, it revealed that the board cut an annual incentive bonus last year to CEO Paul Curlander because of the poor performance of the companies inkjet division.  Since 2005 the company has slashed the workforce, closed factories around the world and concentrated their efforts on people who print more.

Overall, Curlander’s pay dropped more than 18 percent compared with 2006, whilst the other top executives (except for the Chief Financial Officer) saw pay drop too.  He still trousered the top side of $1Million so there is no need to shed tears for him just yet!.

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