Business News

Océ upgrades The Open University to world-best class

Tuesday 11. January 2011 - Faster response rates to student and staff printing requests, together with thousands of pounds in additional annual cost savings, have been welcomed byThe Open University, whose 200,000 students make it the UK's largest.

Four years after the OU introducedOcédigital printing systems and software to re-equip its print facility into a central unit to benefit its own 4,800 campus and regional staff as well as thousands of students worldwide, the campus at Milton Keynes has now taken delivery of an Océ VarioPrint 6160 cut-sheet production press and upgraded its software.
Eoin Diver, The OU’s Operations Support Manager, Information Technology, said: “We have a demonstrably better machine that is far more reliable than the administration focused printers it replaced and is proving to be extremely cost effective and flexible.
“Taking advantage of the duplex click charge, we anticipate savings of around £5,000 per annum on the basis that 50% of our mono work will be done on the Océ VarioPrint 6160. More significantly, the fact that the new unit is 60% faster than the one it replaced, has greater paper capacities and a higher duty cycle, mean we are able to be increasingly responsive to print requests and, importantly, do so with reduced staff effort.”
Print volumes in Milton Keynes have dipped overall from 24 million a year in 2007 to less than 18 million now. The Océ VarioPrint 6160 now prints an additional five million images a year previously done on less-productive systems, thanks to its reliability and ‘just-in-time’ capabilities where much of the output, for instance large calendar runs, can be printed on demand.
In line with the university’s desire to remain at the forefront of electronic submissions and job ticketing, it has also upgraded its software to the latest Océ PRISMA to create greater day-to-day efficiencies and has become the world’s most prolific user of the system. One benefit is that jobs containing both colour and mono output can be printed on different machines and then remerged again.
Stephen Lynch, Océ UK’s Director of Document Printing, said: “This is another example of how we work closely in association with organisations such as the OU to ensure it has the most cost-effective and flexible solution that is best suited for its volumes and requirements. We are delighted that our world-leading print and software systems are continuing to encourage staff to follow ‘best practice’ in the art of improving efficiency and quality, while at the same time saving money for the OU.”