As cyber threats intensify, organisations across Australia and New Zealand need to get serious about securing their printing and document environments, particularly given the hybrid work model is here to stay.
78% of organisations surveyed have experienced security breaches or data loss linked to their print infrastructure over the past 24 months. The alarming incidence of security breaches suggests print fleets haven’t been considered a vulnerability and that more must be done to secure business and customer data.
Over the next 12 months, 49% of ANZ organisations plan on upping their cybersecurity budgets. As part of this renewed focus on security, organisations are particularly interested in measures such as secure printing policies and tools—encompassing user authentication, encryption and secure release printing—to prevent unauthorised access to sensitive documents.
As organisations in Australia and New Zealand continue to embrace digital transformation, digitising document workflows will become an ever more important means of improving efficiency, reducing costs and enhancing user experiences. Organisations must leverage intelligent document capture technologies to streamline operations and remain competitive.
Currently, only about 25% of document workflows have been digitised, with IDC research indicating this figure will rise to 40% across the surveyed organisations within the next 24 months. While these figures may seem low, they highlight the ongoing need for printed documents due to legal and regulatory requirements.
The primary drivers of digitisation are the perceived improvements in customer and employee experience, revenue growth, and enhanced compliance and security. However, maintenance costs, user access management, and document lifecycle policy management must be managed to ensure compliance and document integrity.
In a climate of rising costs, remote work and an increase in cybersecurity threats, cloud adoption represents a no-brainer, yet print cloud adoption has been relatively slow to date.
Nearly 46% of organisations have implemented cloud printing across some or all of their devices, with an additional 30% planning to adopt cloud-based printing within the next 24 months.
38% of organisations cited cost management as a top priority over the next 12-24 months, no easy feat in an inflationary environment. Shifting to cloud can yield an overall reduction in IT infrastructure costs in relation to hardware maintenance, upgrades, and ongoing updates.
As organisations come to see the potential for artificial intelligence (AI) to enhance a wide array of business processes, print and scan environments will emerge as obvious opportunities. While current adoption rates remain low, there is a strong interest in AI and opportunities abound.
Only 17% of the surveyed organisations have adopted AI solutions to date. However, 44% of respondents plan to do so within the next 24 months, which confirms the burgeoning interest for an AI technology solution across SMBs, enterprise organisations and government agencies.
The anticipated benefits of AI adoption in print and document environments include improved device management, more efficient service, and enhanced document routing and workflows. However, the low rates of adoption so far indicate the presence of various barriers, including security concerns, cost, and data quality.
“Change is the law of life and those who look
– John F. Kennedy
only to the past or present are certain to miss the future.”