by Bradley Hughes, Senior Analyst, IDC Canada -
The first fax machine was invented in 1861 and, amazingly, the need for fax capabilities is still demanded by business today.
In the first half of 2007, the market for MFPs (or All-in-Ones) with fax capabilities has grown 25% from the first half of 2006. This is happening in a situation where the MFP market itself has only grown 5% over the same period of time. Meaning that nearly 40% of MFPs shipped in Canada in the first half of 2007 had fax capabilities.
Now there is a chance that end-users are finally realizing that there are fax capabilities within many MFP models (IDC does not track the stand-alone fax market) but the tenacity of fax technology and the fact that it is still relevant is incredible.
For some reason, scanning & emailing (or scanning to email) just isn't cutting it. Perhaps people like hearing that familiar fax squelch when a connection is made. Or they enjoy that lonely time standing in front of the fax ensuring it goes through properly. I don't know but to heck with the notion of the paper-less office, we've got to at least get to the fax-less office first.