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Xerox

 
Hoover's Profile: Xerox Corporation
(NYSE:XRX)
Company Financials
Income Statement
Balance Sheet
Cash Flow Statement

Contact Information
Xerox Corporation
45 Glover Ave.
Norwalk, CT 06856
CT Tel. 203-968-3000
Fax 203-968-3944

Type: Public
On the web: http://www.xerox.com
Employees: 57,100
Employee growth: (0.5%)

You won't find many companies listed in the dictionary as a verb. Xerox is best known for its color and black-and-white copiers, but it also makes printers, scanners, and fax machines. The company sells document management software and copier supplies, offers such services as consulting and document outsourcing, and holds a stake in a joint venture with FUJIFILM called Fuji Xerox. Xerox designs its products for businesses in the financial services, graphic arts, health care, government, and industrial sectors. Customers include FedEx Office and Southern Company. The company's subsidiaries include the Palo Alto Research Center (PARC) and marketing software provider XMPie. The US provides about half of sales.

Key numbers for fiscal year ending December, 2008:
Sales: $17,608.0M
One year growth: 2.2%
Net income: $230.0M
Income growth: (79.7%)

Officers:
Chairman: Anne M. Mulcahy
CEO and Director: Ursula M. Burns
EVP and CFO: Lawrence A. (Larry) Zimmerman

Competitors:
Canon
Hewlett-Packard
Ricoh Company

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Company News: Xerox
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Company History: Xerox Corporation
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Incorporated: 1906 as The Haloid Company
NAIC: 333315 Photographic and Photocopying Equipment Manufacturing; 334119 Other Computer Peripheral Equipment Manufacturing; 333313 Office Machinery Manufacturing; 518210 Data Processing, Hosting, and Related Services

Xerox Corporation, though virtually synonymous with photocopying, makes printers, scanners, fax machines, multifunction devices, and digital printing and publishing systems in addition to its flagship black-and-white and color copiers. The firm's related services operations encompass consulting, imaging, content management, and document outsourcing services. Increasingly expanding beyond its black-and-white offerings, Xerox now derives more then 20 percent of its revenues from color printers, copiers, digital presses, and related services and supplies. Approximately 45 percent of revenues are generated by the company's numerous overseas offices, subsidiaries, and joint ventures. Fuji Xerox Co., Ltd., a joint venture with Fuji Photo Film Co., Ltd., 25 percent owned by Xerox and 75 percent by Fuji, develops, manufactures, and distributes document processing products in Japan and the Pacific Rim (including Australia, New Zealand, Indonesia, Malaysia, the Philippines, Singapore, South Korea, Taiwan, Thailand, Vietnam, China, and Hong Kong).

Xerox can trace its roots to 1906, when a photography-paper business named The Haloid Company was established in Rochester, New York. Its neighbor, Eastman Kodak Company, ignored the company, and Haloid managed to build a business on the fringe of the photography market. In 1912 control of the company was sold for $50,000 to Rochester businessman Gilbert E. Mosher, who became president but left the day-to-day running of the company to its founders.

Mosher kept Haloid profitable and opened sales offices in Chicago, Boston, and New York City. To broaden the company's market share, Haloid's board decided to develop a better paper. It took several years, but when Haloid Record finally came out in 1933 it was so successful that it saved the company from the worst of the Great Depression. By 1934 Haloid's sales were approaching $1 million. In 1935 Joseph R. Wilson, the son of one of the founders, decided that Haloid should buy the Rectigraph Company, a photocopying machine manufacturer that used Haloid's paper. To help pay for the acquisition, Haloid went public in 1936, and selling Rectigraphs became an important part of Haloid's business.

In 1936 Haloid's 120 employees went on strike for benefits and higher wages. When Mosher proved intransigent, Wilson stepped in and offered concessions. Tension and resentment between labor and management persisted until World War II. During the war the Armed Forces needed high-quality photographic paper for reconnaissance, and business boomed. When the war ended Haloid faced stiff competition from new paper manufacturers.

Amidst this, Haloid needed to come up with new products, particularly following a showdown between Mosher, who wanted to sell Haloid, and Wilson, who did not. Wilson won, and in 1947 Haloid entered into an agreement with Battelle Memorial Institute, a nonprofit research organization in Columbus, Ohio, to produce a machine based on a new process called xerography.

Xerography, a word derived from the Greek words for "dry" and "writing," was the invention of Chester Carlson. Carlson was born in Seattle, Washington, in 1906 and became a patent lawyer employed by a New York electronics firm. Frustrated by the difficulty and expense of copying documents, Carlson in 1938 invented a method of transferring images from one piece of paper to another using static electricity. In 1944 Battelle signed a royalty-sharing agreement with Carlson and began to develop commercial applications for xerography.

In 1949, two years after Haloid signed its agreement with Battelle, Haloid introduced the XeroX Copier, initially spelled with a capital X at the end. The machine, which required much of the processing to be done manually, was difficult and messy to use and made errors frequently. Many in the financial community thought that Haloid's large investment in xerography was a big mistake, but Battelle engineers discovered that the XeroX made excellent masters for offset printing, an unforeseen quality that sold many machines. Haloid invested earnings from these sales in research on a second-generation xerographic copier.

In 1950 Battelle made Haloid the sole licensing agency for all patents based on xerography, but Battelle owned the basic patents until 1955. Haloid licensed the patents liberally to spread the usage of xerography to such corporations as RCA, IBM, and General Electric. In 1950 Haloid sold its first commercial contract for a xerographic copier to the State of Michigan. Meanwhile, Haloid's other products were again highly profitable, with paper sales increasing and several successful new office photocopying machines selling well.

In 1953 Carlson received the Edward Longstreth Medal of Merit for the invention of xerography from the Franklin Institute. In 1955 Haloid revamped its 18 regional offices into showrooms for its Xerox machines instead of photo-paper warehouses, hired 200 sales and service people, began building the first Xerox factory in Webster, New York, and introduced three new types of photography paper. Haloid also introduced the Copyflo, Haloid's semiautomatic copying machine. In 1956 Haloid President Joe Wilson, Joseph R. Wilson's son, formed an overseas affiliate called Rank Xerox with the Rank Organisation Plc, a British film company seeking to diversify. This arrangement paved the way for Xerox factories in Great Britain and a sales and distribution system that brought Xerox machines to the European market.

In 1958 Haloid changed its name to Haloid Xerox Inc., reflecting its belief that the company's future lay with xerography, although photography products were still more profitable. That balance quickly changed with the success of the Xerox 914 copier. Introduced in 1960, it was the first automatic Xerox copier, and the first marketable plain-paper copier. The company could not afford a blanket advertising campaign, so it placed ads in magazines and on television programs where it hoped business owners would see them. The company also offered the machines for monthly lease to make xerography affordable for smaller businesses.

Demand for the 650-pound 914 model exceeded Haloid Xerox's most optimistic projections, despite its large size. Fortune later called the copier "the most successful product ever marketed in America." Sales and rental of xerographic products doubled in 1961 and kept growing. In 1961 the company was listed on the New York Stock Exchange, changed its name to Xerox Corporation, and photography operations were placed under the newly created Haloid photo division. In 1962 Xerox formed Fuji Xerox Co., Ltd. in Japan with Fuji Photo Film Co., Ltd. Also during the 1960s Xerox opened subsidiaries in Australia, Mexico, and continental Europe. The company had sunk $12.5 million into developing the 914 copier, more than Haloid's total earnings from 1950 to 1959, and the 914 had led the company to more than $1 billion in sales by 1968. In 1963 Xerox introduced a desktop version of the 914, Although this machine sold well, it was not very profitable, and Xerox depended on its larger machines thereafter.

With its suddenly large profits, Xerox began a string of acquisitions, purchasing University Microfilms in 1962 and Electro-Optical Systems in 1963. The market for copiers continued to expand at such a rate that they remained Xerox's chief source of revenue. The 1960s were a tremendously successful time for Xerox, which became one of the 100 largest corporations in the United States and, in 1969, moved its headquarters to Stamford, Connecticut.

In the late 1960s Xerox began to focus its efforts on the concept of an electronic office that would not use paper. With this end in mind the corporation bought a computer company, Scientific Data Systems, in 1969, for nearly $1 billion in stock, only to have it fail and close down in 1975. Xerox also formed Xerox Computer Services in 1970, bought several small computer firms in the next few years, and opened the Xerox Palo Alto Research Center (PARC) in California.

In 1973 scientists at PARC invented what may have been the world's first personal computer. So innovative was the work of the PARC scientists that many features they invented later appeared on Apple Macintosh computers. In fact, in December 1989 Xerox would sue Apple Computer for $150 million, alleging that Apple had stolen the technology that helped make its computers so successful. Apple cofounder Steven Jobs, who later hired some researchers from PARC, claimed that his company had refined Xerox's work, and thus made it original.

PARC's innovations were largely overlooked by Xerox. The computer division and the copier division competed for resources and failed to communicate. Products were released by the office products division in Dallas, Texas, which PARC had never seen before. Disagreements broke out at Xerox headquarters at the suggestion of change, which further stifled innovation.

In April 1970 IBM introduced an office copying machine, giving Xerox its first real competition. IBM's machine was not as fast or as sophisticated as the Xerox copiers, but it was well built and was backed by IBM's reputation. Xerox responded with a suit charging IBM with patent infringement. The dispute was settled in 1978 when IBM paid Xerox $25 million. Meanwhile, Xerox itself became a defendant in several antitrust violation investigations, including a lawsuit by the Federal Trade Commission. Distracted from its market by legal battles, Xerox lost its lead in the industry when Kodak came out with a more sophisticated copier. IBM and Kodak followed a strategy similar to that of Xerox, leasing their machines and attracting many large accounts on which Xerox depended.

According to most critics, Xerox had become inefficient during this time, as its executives had concentrated too heavily on growth during the 1960s. Xerox had spent hundreds of millions of dollars on product development but introduced few new products. Engineers and designers were divided into small groups that fought over details as they missed deadlines. While the company sought to perfect the copying machine, it failed to challenge the new products on the market, and Xerox's market share dropped.

By 1985 Xerox's worldwide plain-paper copier share had dropped to 40 percent, from 85 percent in 1974. Yet Xerox's revenues grew from $1.6 billion in 1970 to $8 billion in 1980, partially because Xerox began to sell the machines it had been renting, thus depleting its lease base.

Beginning in the mid-1970s, Japanese products emerged as an even more dangerous threat. Xerox machines were big and complex and averaged three breakdowns per month. The Japanese firm Ricoh Company, Ltd., however, introduced a less expensive, smaller machine that broke down less often. The Japanese strategy was to capture the low end of the market and move up. By 1980 another Japanese competitor, Canon Inc., was challenging Xerox's market share in higher-end machines.

In the late 1970s Xerox began reorganizing, making market share its goal and learning some lessons about quality control and low-end copiers from its Japanese subsidiary. The company also cut manufacturing costs drastically. Xerox regained copier market share, but intense price competition kept copier revenues around $8 billion for most of the 1980s.

In 1981 Xerox finally began releasing new products, beginning with the Memorywriter typewriter. This typewriter soon outsold IBM's and captured over 20 percent of the electric typewriter market. By January 1983 Xerox had unveiled a Memorywriter that could store large amounts of data internally. In 1982 the 10-Series copiers, the first truly new line since the 1960s, was introduced. These machines used microprocessors to regulate internal functions and were able to perform a variety of complicated tasks on different types of paper. They were also smaller and far less likely to break down than earlier Xerox copiers. The 10-Series machines used technology developed at PARC, which was becoming more integrated with the company. Xerox began gaining market share for the first time in years, and morale improved.

Xerox also released computer workstations and software and built a $1 billion business in laser printers. The workstations proved an expensive flop, however, and by 1989 the company closed its workstation hardware business. Xerox also moved to protect its 50 percent share of the high-end market in the United States with machines that made 70 or more copies per minute. The major high-end competition was Kodak, but the Japanese, led by Ricoh, were again launching a drive for this market.

During the 1970s Xerox had also diversified into financial services. In 1983 it bought Crum and Forster Inc., a property casualty insurer, and in 1984 it formed Xerox Financial Services, Inc. (XFS), which bought two investment-banking firms in the next few years. By 1988 XFS supplied nearly 50 percent of Xerox's income--$315 million of the $632 million total. XFS performed well, able to raise funds at a low cost because it was backed by the Xerox "A" credit rating.

Xerox spent more than $3 billion on research and development in the 1980s looking for new technologies, such as those for digital and color copying, to promote growth. Xerox was a leader in developing technologies, but often had trouble creating and marketing products based on them, particularly computers.

In 1988 Xerox underwent a $275 million restructuring, cutting 2,000 jobs, shrinking its electronic typewriter output, dropping its medical systems business, and creating a new marketing organization, Integrated Systems Operations, to get new technologies into the marketplace more effectively. Xerox's comeback was so impressive that in 1989 its Business Products and Systems unit won the U.S. Congress's Malcolm Baldridge National Quality Award for regaining its lead in copier quality. Xerox had demonstrated its ability to change in the late 1970s when it responded to the first wave of Japanese competition.

In 1990 when David T. Kearns, CEO since 1932, retired to become U.S. Deputy Secretary of Education, and Paul A. Allaire, a career Xerox man, was named to replace him, industry analysts speculated that Allaire would have to repeat the feats of the 1970s if Xerox were to survive as an independent corporation. A restructuring of company management occurred almost immediately. The office of the president was transformed into a document processing corporate office led by Allaire and including Executive Vice-Presidents A. Barry Rand and Vittorio Cassoni, and Senior Vice-Presidents Mark B. Myers and Allan E. Dugan. Two years later, Xerox announced plans to restructure the company as well. Three customer service operations units were created in Connecticut, New York, and England. In addition, nine document processing business units were established, each of which was headed by a president responsible for the profitability of the unit.

During the seven-month period from September 1990 to March 1991, Xerox introduced five new types of computer printers: the Xerox 4350, Xerox 4197, Xerox 4135, Xerox 4235, and Xerox 4213. These printers were designed to handle a wide variety of office needs from two-color printing to desktop laser printing. In October 1990 the Docu-Tech Production Publisher signaled Xerox's intent to take advantage of what the company foresaw as an industry move from offset printing to electronic printing and copying.

The introduction of the Xerox 5775 Digital Color Copier was met with great fanfare and was expected to rejuvenate sales. Xerox also continued to update and improve its facsimile machines by developing a personal-sized model that could be used as a copier as well as a telephone, and by developing thermal, recyclable fax paper. In May 1992 Xerox introduced Paperworks, software making it possible to send documents to a fax machine directly from a PC.

Despite these new products, financial and legal woes continued to plague Xerox in the early 1990s as American economic conditions worsened. After earnings of $235 million in the fourth quarter of 1990, Xerox reported only $91 million in profits for the same period the following year. Earlier in 1990, just four months after the creation of the X-Soft division, which was to develop and market the company's software products, Xerox announced that it would lay off 10 percent of X-Soft's employees. In February 1992 the company offered severance pay to 6,000 of its American employees in an attempt to reduce the workforce by 2,500 by July.

By the end of 1991, Xerox was announcing the sale of three of its insurance wholesalers. Crum and Forster sold Floyd West & Co. and Floyd West of Louisiana to Burns & Wilcox Ltd. London Brokers Ltd. was sold to Crump E & S. Moreover, several lawsuits resulted in losses for Xerox during this time. In February 1992 Xerox was ordered to pay Gradco Systems, Inc. $2.5 million to settle a patent dispute, and a suit settled in favor of Monsanto a month later was expected to cost Xerox $142 million to clean up a hazardous waste dump site.

With its core office products businesses on the upswing, Xerox announced in January 1993 that it intended to exit from insurance and its other financial services businesses. Later that year Crum and Forster was renamed Talegen Holdings Inc. and was restructured into seven stand-alone operating groups in order to facilitate their piecemeal sale. This exit took several years, however, and was delayed when a 1996 deal to sell several units to Kohlberg Kravis Roberts & Company for $2.36 billion collapsed. During 1995 two of the groups were sold for a total of $524 million in cash. In 1997 three more were sold for a total of $890 million in cash and the assumption of $154 million in debt. Then in January 1998 Xerox completed the sale of Westchester Specialty Group, Inc. to Bermuda-based ACE Limited for $338 million, less $70 million in transaction-related costs. Finally, Xerox in August 1998 sold its last remaining insurance unit, Crum & Forster Holdings, Inc., to Fairfax Financial Holdings Limited of Toronto for $680 million.

As it was exiting from financial services, Xerox was also beginning to shed its image as a copier company. In 1994 Xerox began calling itself The Document Company to emphasize the wide range of document processing products it produced. A new logo included a red "X" that was partially digitized, representing the company's shift from analog technologies to digital ones. A number of new digital products were developed over the next several years, including digital copiers that also served as printers, fax machines, and scanners (so-called multifunction devices). From 1995 to 1997 revenue from analog copiers was virtually stagnant, even falling slightly, whereas revenue from digital products enjoyed double-digit growth, increasing to $6.7 billion by 1997.

Xerox also shifted focus from black-and-white to highly sought-after color machines, with revenues from color copying and printing increasing 46 percent to $1.5 billion in 1997. The most notable introduction here was the DocuColor 40, launched in 1996, which captured more than 50 percent of the high-speed color copier market based on its ability to print 40 full-color pages per minute. Revitalized new product development at Xerox resulted in the introduction of 80 new products in 1997 alone, the most in company history and twice the number of the previous year. More Xerox products were being developed for the small office/home office market, with prices low enough that the company increasingly marketed its products via such retailers as CompUSA, Office Depot, OfficeMax, and Staples.

However, the new Xerox was about more than just office products. The company introduced DocuShare document-management software in 1997, providing a system for users to post, manage, and share information on company intranets. Xerox also gained the leading market share position in the burgeoning document outsourcing services sector through the 1997-created Document Services Group. This group offered such services as the creation of digital libraries, the design of electronic-commerce systems for Internet-based transactions, as well as professional document consulting services. In May 1998 Xerox bolstered its Document Services Group through the $413 million acquisition of XLConnect Solutions Inc. (renamed Xerox Connect) and its parent Intelligent Electronics, Inc. XLConnect specialized in the design, building, and support of networks for companywide document solutions.

The mid-1990s also saw Xerox launch a restructuring in 1994, leading to 10,000 job cuts over a three-year period. In February 1995 the company paid The Rank Organisation about $972 million to increase its stake in Rank Xerox to 80 percent. Then in June 1997 Xerox spent an additional $1.5 billion to buy Rank out entirely. With full control of the unit, Xerox renamed it Xerox Limited. That same month G. Richard Thoman, who had been senior vice-president and chief financial officer at IBM, was named president and chief operating officer of Xerox, with Allaire remaining chairman and CEO.

In April 1998 Xerox announced yet another major restructuring, as its shift to the digital world led it to spend more on overhead than its competitors. The company eliminated 9,000 jobs over the next two years, taking a $1.11 billion after-tax charge in the second quarter of 1998 in the process. The cuts came at a time when Xerox was enjoying record sales and earnings as well as a surging stock price, so the company was clearly proactive in maintaining the momentum it had gained through its impressive 1990s resurgence.

This resurgence, however, came to a crashing halt during the later months of 1999. For both the third and fourth quarters, Xerox was forced to issue warnings that its profits would be well below the expectations of Wall Street analysts, sending its stock tumbling. Sales and profits were hurt by a number of factors, several of which were out of the company's control: the strength of the dollar against European currencies; heightened competition from Japanese rivals, particularly Canon, which launched new lines of midrange and high-end copiers that ate into Xerox's market share; a slump in the sales of high-end copiers and printing systems late in the year because of Y2K fears; and a severe economic downturn in Brazil, a longtime key market for Xerox that had been responsible for about 10 percent of sales and an even-larger portion of profits. On top of these challenges, Xerox shot itself in the foot by botching two corporate restructurings. A consolidation of customer administration centers launched in 1998 led to chaos, including delayed and lost orders, unreturned phone calls, and billing errors. During 1999 Xerox reorganized its worldwide sales force, shifting about half of the 30,000-person operation from a geographic focus to an industry focus. Although this change was long overdue, it was not implemented smoothly, leading to disgruntled staffers, furious customers, and lost sales. Also burdening the company was servicing some $16 billion in total debt.

Early in 2000 Xerox acquired the color printing and imaging unit of Tektronix, Inc. for $925 million. The move made Xerox the number two player in the U.S. market for color laser printers, trailing only Hewlett-Packard Company. The deal was an important one, coming at a time when in many offices the proliferating computer printer was taking over some of the functions of the copier. Before it could bear fruit, however, a management shakeup jolted the company. As the firm's financial performance deteriorated, Thoman was forced to resign as CEO in May 2000. Allaire temporarily reassumed that position, and company veteran Anne M. Mulcahy was named president. By this time, Xerox's stock had fallen 60 percent from its level one year earlier.

In October 2000 the company reported a third-quarter loss of $167 million--its first quarterly loss in 16 years--and initiated the first of a string of restructuring programs. Aiming to slash $1 billion in annual operating expenses (6 percent of its total costs), Xerox placed a number of assets on the block. Late in the year it sold its subsidiaries in China and Hong Kong to Fuji Xerox for $550 million. Then in March 2001 Xerox sold half of its stake in Fuji Xerox itself to Fuji Photo Film for more than $1.3 billion in cash, reducing its interest in the joint venture to 25 percent. In another key move, Xerox outsourced about half of its worldwide manufacturing operations to Flextronics International Ltd., at the same time selling to Flextronics plants in Canada, Mexico, Malaysia, the Netherlands, and Brazil. Several other noncore operations were also sold off as part of this overhaul, which in total culled 11,200 positions from the payroll. During 2001 a separate restructuring, which aimed to sharpen the company's focus, saw Xerox eliminate product lines aimed at the small office/home office business segment. Approximately 1,200 more employees were laid off. Xerox eliminated its stock dividend that year in order to conserve cash, and in August, Mulcahy was named CEO. She replaced Allaire as chairman in early 2002.

Late in 2000 the Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) launched an investigation into Xerox's accounting practices for the period from 1997 to 2000. The SEC eventually found that the company had been improperly accounting for revenues associated with office equipment it leased to customers, booking more of the lease revenue up front than was proper and thereby artificially--if temporarily--inflating revenue and, according the SEC, misleading investors. In April 2002 Xerox agreed to pay a record $10 million civil penalty to settle the charges. A few months later it restated its results for 1997 to 2001, shifting $1.41 billion in pretax income among the years. For instance, for 1998 the company now reported a pretax loss of $13 million rather than the previously reported pretax profit of $579 million, whereas the pretax loss for 2001 of $293 million was trimmed to $71 million. The SEC went after several Xerox executives as well. In June 2003 the agency reached an agreement with six executives (five former and one current, including Allaire, Thoman, and former CFO Barry Romeril), who agreed to pay $22 million in fines and other penalties. The SEC was highly critical of the managers, contending that they had personally profited from bonuses and stock sales that had been based on false financial results.

In addition to shedding unprofitable businesses and lines of business, and eliminating tens of thousands of workers from the workforce (which was reduced by one-third from the beginning of 2001 to the end of 2003, from 92,500 to 61,100), Xerox vastly improved its balance sheet. During 2002 a $7 billion line of credit was successfully renegotiated, while the following year saw the completion of a $3.6 billion recapitalization plan that included public offerings of common stock, the issuance of convertible preferred stock, and the securing of a new $1 billion credit facility. Total debt was reduced from $18.64 billion in 2000 to $11.17 billion in 2003. Perhaps most importantly, Xerox moved aggressively to regain lost market share by introducing 38 new products during 2002 and 2003 as well as a wide range of new document-related services. The product line placed particular emphasis on digital and color copiers and enhanced multifunction devices capable of printing, copying, scanning, faxing, and e-mailing.

Through Mulcahy's able leadership and dogged pursuit of a turnaround, Xerox was able to post strong results for 2003. Net income of $360 million was the firm's highest profit level since 1999. Xerox's stock rebounded in 2003 and 2004, although it remained well below the levels of 1999 and early 2000. Debt was reduced further during 2004 to less than $10 billion, and the now cash-rich company was poised to begin pursuing acquisitions again. From the real possibility of bankruptcy when she took over, Mulcahy had engineered at least the beginnings of a remarkable comeback, though the competitive environment showed no sign of becoming less brutal.

Principal Subsidiaries

Palo Alto Research Center Incorporated; Xerox Credit Corporation; Xerox Financial Services, Inc.; Xerox Canada Inc.; Xerox GmbH (Germany); Xerox Limited (U.K.). The company also lists some 250 additional subsidiaries in the United States, Canada, Mexico, Argentina, Brazil, Chile, Colombia, Costa Rica, Dominican Republic, Ecuador, Guatemala, Haiti, Honduras, Nicaragua, Panama, Peru, Venezuela, Austria, Belgium, Bulgaria, Czech Republic, Denmark, Finland, France, Germany, Greece, Hungary, Ireland, Italy, Luxembourg, the Netherlands, Norway, Poland, Portugal, Romania, Russia, Slovenia, Spain, Sweden, Switzerland, Turkey, Ukraine, the United Kingdom, Yugoslavia, Egypt, Morocco, China, India, and elsewhere.

Principal Competitors

Canon Inc.; Ricoh Company, Ltd.; Hewlett-Packard Company; Sharp Corporation; Konica Minolta Holdings, Inc.

Further Reading

Alexander, Robert C., and Douglas K. Smith, Fumbling the Future: How Xerox Invented, Then Ignored, the First Personal Computer, New York: William Morrow, 1988, 274 p.

Arner, Faith, and Adam Aston, "How Xerox Got Up to Speed," Business Week, May 3, 2004, p. 103.

Bandler, James, and John Hechinger, "Six Figures in Xerox Case Are Fined $22 Million," Wall Street Journal, June 6, 2003, p. A3.

Bandler, James, and Mark Maremont, "Xerox to Pay $10 Million in SEC Case," Wall Street Journal, April 2, 2002, p. A3.

Bianco, Anthony, and Pamela L. Moore, "Downfall X: The Inside Story of the Management Fiasco at Xerox," Business Week, March 5, 2001, pp. 82-88, 90, 92.

Brady, Diane, Ira Sager, and Janet Rae-Dupree, "Xerox: Can New CEO Rick Thoman Turn Its Digital Dreams into Reality?," Business Week, April 12, 1999, pp. 92-96, 98, 100.

Byrne, John A., "Culture Shock at Xerox," Business Week, June 22, 1987, pp. 106+.

Byrnes, Nanette, "Xerox Is Dreaming in Color," Business Week, December 13, 2004, p. 70.

Byrnes, Nanette, and Anthony Bianco, "Xerox Has Bigger Worries Than the SEC," Business Week, August 12, 2002, pp. 62-63.

Campanella, Frank W., "Versatile Xerox: Company Builds Up Basic Copier Line, Moves to Diversify," Barron's, September 29, 1980, pp. 9+.

Dessauer, John H., My Years with Xerox, Garden City, N.Y.: Doubleday, 1971.

Deutsch, Claudia H., "Original Thinking for a Digital Xerox," New York Times, April 15, 1997, pp. D1, D6.

Driscoll, Lisa, "The New, New Thinking at Xerox," Business Week, June 22, 1992, pp. 120+.

Eisenberg, Daniel, "An Image Problem at Xerox," Time, October 30, 2000, pp. 63-64.

Hamilton, David P., "United It Stands: Fuji Xerox Is a Rarity in World Business: A Joint Venture That Works," Wall Street Journal, September 26, 1996, p. R19.

Jacobson, Gary, and John Hillkirk, Xerox: American Samurai, New York: Macmillan Publishing, 1986, 338 p.

Kahn, Jeremy, "The Paper Jam from Hell," Fortune, November 13, 2000, pp. 141-42, 146.

Kearns, David T., and David A. Nadler, Prophets in the Dark: How Xerox Reinvented Itself and Beat Back the Japanese, New York: Harper Business, 1992, 334 p.

Moore, Pamela L., "She's Here to Fix the Xerox," Business Week, August 6, 2001, pp. 47-48.

Morris, Betsy, "The Accidental CEO," Fortune, June 23, 2003, pp. 58-60+.

Narisetti, Raju, "Pounded by Printers, Xerox Copiers Go Digital," Wall Street Journal, May 12, 1998, pp. B1, B6.

------, "Xerox Aims to Imprint High-Tech Image," Wall Street Journal, October 6, 1998, p. B8.

------, "Xerox to Cut 9,000 Jobs Over Two Years," Wall Street Journal, April 8, 1998, pp. A3, A6.

------, "Xerox to Sell Crum & Forster for $565 Million," Wall Street Journal, March 12, 1998, p. B6.

------, "Xerox to Sell Resolution Group for $612 Million in Cash, Securities," Wall Street Journal, September 10, 1997, p. B4.

Nevans, Ronald, "Xerox's Billion-Dollar Mistake," Financial World, June 18, 1975, p. 9.

------, "Xerox Comes Through Its Mid-Life Crisis," Financial World, July 15, 1979, p. 18.

"The New Lean, Mean Xerox: Fending Off the Japanese," Business Week, October 12, 1981, pp. 126+.

Norman, James R., "Xerox Rethinks Itself--and This Could Be the Last Time," Business Week, February 13, 1989, pp. 90+.

Palmer, Jay, "Ready to Copy?," Barron's, May 29, 2000, pp. 27-28, 30.

Rudnitsky, Howard, "World's Largest Up and Comer," Forbes, May 18, 1987, pp. 78+.

Santoli, Michael, "Copy This: Xerox Image Is Brightening Again," Barron's, November 1, 2004, pp. 13-14.

Sheridan, John H., "A CEO's Perspective on Innovation," Industry Week, December 19, 1994, pp. 11-12, 14.

Siwolop, Sana, "Man of the Year: Xerox Chairman and CEO David T. Kearns," Financial World, December 12, 1989, pp. 56+.

Smart, Tim, "Can Xerox Duplicate Its Glory Days?," Business Week, October 4, 1993, pp. 56, 58.

------, "So Much for Diversification," Business Week, February 1, 1993, p. 31.

Smart, Tim, and Peter Burrows, "Out to Make Xerox Print More Money," Business Week, August 11, 1997, pp. 81+.

The Story of Xerography, Stamford, Conn.: Xerox Corporation, n.d.

Taub, Stephen, "Will Xerox Keep on Fading?," Financial World, February 15, 1983, pp. 14+.

Uttal, Bro, "Xerox Xooms Toward the Office of the Future," Fortune, May 18, 1981, pp. 44+.

Verespej, Michael A., "Xerox at a Crossroads," Industry Week, May 28, 1984, pp. 21+.

Vogel, Todd, "At Xerox, They're Shouting 'Once More into the Breach,'" Business Week, July 23, 1990, pp. 62+.

Weber, Thomas E., "Xerox to Pay $1.5 Billion to Buy Rank's Stake in Copier Venture," Wall Street Journal, June 9, 1997, p. B4.

Wysocki, Bernard, Jr., "Change Machine: Xerox Recasts Itself As Formidable Force in Digital Revolution," Wall Street Journal, February 2, 1999, p. A1.

"Xerox Tries to Capture Some IBM Territory," Business Week, October 12, 1974, p. 28.

Ziegler, Bart, "Success at IBM Gives Thoman Edge at Xerox," Wall Street Journal, June 13, 1997, pp. B1, B8.

Ziegler, Bart, and Leslie Scism, "Xerox Shares Fall 5.6% After Collapse of the Sale of Insurance Units to KKR," Wall Street Journal, September 13, 1996, pp. A2, A4.

Zweig, Phillip, "A Pale Copy," Financial World, October 20, 1987, pp. 20+.

— Scott M. Lewis


WordNet: Xerox
Top
Note: click on a word meaning below to see its connections and related words.

The noun has one meaning:

Meaning #1: duplicator that copies graphic matter by the action of light on an electrically charged photoconductive insulating surface in which the latent image is developed with a resinous powder
  Synonyms: xerographic copier, Xerox machine


Wikipedia: Xerox
Top
Xerox Corporation
Type Public (NYSE: XRX)
Founded Rochester, New York, United States (1906)
Headquarters Norwalk, Connecticut, United States, United States Offices in Rochester, New York, United States
Key people Ursula Burns, CEO
Anne M. Mulcahy, Chairman
Larry Zimmerman, CFO
Gary R. Kabureck CAO
Michael MacDonald, President, Marketing Operations
Industry Document Services
Computer Peripherals
Products Digital Imaging
Printers
Revenue US$17.6 billion (2008)
Employees 57,400 (2007)
Website http://www.xerox.com
Xerox's former headquarters in Stamford (now headquartered in Norwalk)

Xerox Corporation (NYSEXRX; pronounced /ˈzɪərɒks/) is a fortune 500 global document management company (founded in 1906) which manufactures and sells a range of color and black-and-white printers, multifunction systems, photo copiers, digital production printing presses, and related consulting services and supplies. Xerox is headquartered in Norwalk, Connecticut (moved from Stamford, Connecticut in October 2007[1]), though its largest population of employees is based in and around Rochester, New York, the area in which the company was founded. On September 28, 2009, Xerox announced the intended acquisition of Affiliated Computer Services for $6.4 billion. Xerox holds a Royal Warrant from HM Queen Elizabeth II and the Prince of Wales.

Contents

History

The Xerox 914 was the first one-piece plain paper photocopier, and sold in the thousands.

Xerox was founded in 1906 in Rochester as "The Haloid Photographic Company",[2] which originally manufactured photographic paper and equipment. The company subsequently changed its name to "Haloid Xerox" in 1958 and then simply "Xerox" in 1961.[3] The company came to prominence in 1959 with the introduction of the Xerox 914, the first plain paper photocopier using the process of Electro-photography, (later changed to xerography) developed by Chester Carlson.[4] The 914 was so popular that by the end of 1961, Xerox had almost $60 million in revenue. By 1965, revenues leaped to over $500 million. Before releasing the 914, Xerox had tested the market by introducing a developed version of the prototype 'Hand equipment', known as the 'Flat-plate' 1385. This was followed by the first automatic xerographic printer, the "Copyflo," in 1955. The Copiflo was a large microfilm printer, producing positive prints, on roll paper, from any type of microfilm negative. Following the Copyflo, the process was scaled down to produce the 1824 microfilm printer. At about half the size and weight this, still sizable, machine printed onto hand fed, cut sheet paper which was pulled through the process by one of two 'gripper bars'. This gripper feed system, when scaled down, was to become the basis for the 813 desktop copier.

In 1963, Xerox introduced the Xerox 813, the first desktop plain-paper copier, bringing Carlson's vision of a copier that could fit on anyone's office desk into a reality. Ten years later in 1973, a basic, analogue, color copier, based on the 914, followed. The 914 itself was gradually speeded up to become the 420 and 720. The 813 was similarly developed into the 330 and 660 products and ,eventually, also the 740 desktop microfiche printer.

Chester Carlson's original hand equipment, which saw the market as the 1385 Flatplate, was not actualy a viable copier because of its speed of operation. In consequence it was sold as a platemaker to the offset lithography market. It was little more than a high quality, comercially available plate camera, mounted as a horizontal rostrum camera, complete with photo-flood lighting and timer. The glass film/plate, however, had been replaced with an aluminum plate, coated in selenium. Clever electrics turned this into a quick developing and reusable substitute for film. A skilled user could produce fast, paper and metal printing plates of a higher quality than almost any other method. Having started as a supplier to the offset litho. duplicating industry, Xerox now set its sights on capturing some of offset's market share.

Xerox's first foray into duplicating, as distinct from copying, was with the Xerox 2400. This number denoted the number of prints produced in an hour. Although still some way short of offset speeds, this machine introduced the industry's first Automatic Document Feeder, Slitter/Perforator and Collator (sorter). This product was soon speeded up, fifty percent, to become the Xerox 3600 Duplicator.

As an aside, whilst all the above was going on, in a small lab a team were borrowing copiers, off the line, and modifying them. Called the Long Distance Xerography project (LDX for short) and beginning with 914s, the aim was to be able to connect two copiers together, via the public telephone network, such that a document scanned on one machine would be copied out on the other. Many years later this work came to fruition in the Xerox Telecopiers. The embryo of all today's domestic Fax. machines. Incidentally, most of the modern, digital, Multifunction Copiers can be used as Fax machines, precisely in the way originaly envisioned.

The company expanded substantially throughout the 1960s, making millionaires of some long-suffering investors who had nursed the company through the slow research and development phase of the product. In 1960, the "Wilson Center for Research and Technology" was opened in Webster, New York, a research facility for xerography. Then in 1961, the company changed its name to "Xerox Corporation". Xerox common stock (XRX) was listed on the New York Stock Exchange in 1961 and on the Chicago Stock Exchange in 1990.

In 1969, Xerox acquired Scientific Data Systems [SDS], and produced the Sigma line of 32-bit mainframe computers in the 1960s and 1970s.

The laser printer was invented in 1969 by Xerox researcher Gary Starkweather by modifying a Xerox copier. This development resulted in the first commercially available laser printer, the Xerox 9700, being launched in 1977. Laser printing eventually became a multi billion dollar business for Xerox. Archie McCardell was named president of the company in 1971.[5] During his tenure, Xerox introduced its first color copier.[6] During McCardell's reign at Xerox, the company announced record revenues, earnings and profits in 1973, 1974, and 1975.[7] John Carrol became a backer, later spreading the company throughout North America.

Following these years of record profits, in 1975 Xerox resolved an anti-trust suit with the Federal Trade Commission (FTC), which at the time was under the direction of Frederic M. Scherer. The Xerox consent decree resulted in the forced licensing of the company’s entire patent portfolio, mainly to Japanese competitors. Within four years of the consent decree, Xerox's share of the U.S. copier market dropped from nearly 100% to less than 14%.

In 1970, under company president Charles Peter McColough, Xerox opened the Xerox PARC (Xerox Palo Alto Research Center) research facility. The facility developed many modern computing technologies such as the mouse and the graphical user interface (GUI). From these inventions, Xerox PARC created the Xerox Alto in 1973, a small minicomputer similar to a modern workstation or personal computer. This machine can be considered the first true Personal Computer, given its versatile combination of a cathode-ray-type screen, mouse-type pointing device, and a QWERTY-type alphanumeric keyboard. But the Alto was never commercially sold, as Xerox itself could not see the sales potential of it. It was, however, installed in Xerox's own offices, worldwide and those of the US Government and military, who could see the potential. Within these sites the individual workstations were connected together by Xerox's own unique LAN, 'The Ethernet'. Data was sent around this system of heavy, yellow, low loss coaxial cable using the 'packet data' system. Soon Xerox's engineers worked out how to connect the individual sites together, using a system they called 'Inter Network Routing'. This was quickly abbreviated to the first three sylables. Initially there were two seperate, private, worldwide networks. That of the US government and Xerox's own.

In 1979, Xerox threw open it's doors to anyone in the industry and press, who might be interested in seeing their developments. Several Apple Computer employees, including Steve Jobs, visited Xerox PARC that day. Jobs and the others saw the commercial potential of the 'WIMP' (Windows, Icons, Mouse, and Pulldown menus) system and redirected development of the Apple Lisa to incorporate these technologies. Jobs is quoted as saying "They just had no idea what they had." In 1980, Jobs invited several key PARC researchers to join his company so that they could fully develop and implement their ideas. At Microsoft, who had also ben present, Bill Gates and co. had similar thoughts.

The Xerox Alto workstation was developed at Xerox PARC

In 1981 Xerox released a system similar to the Alto, the Xerox 6085 Star. It was the first commercial system to incorporate technologies that have subsequently become commonplace in personal computers, such as a bitmapped display, window-based GUI, mouse, Ethernet networking, file servers, print servers and e-mail. The Xerox 6085 Star, despite its technological breakthroughs, did not sell well due to its high price, costing $16,000 per unit. A typical Xerox Star-based office, complete with network and printers, would have cost $100,000.

In the mid 1980s, Apple considered buying Xerox; however, a deal was never reached. Apple instead bought rights to the Alto GUI and adapted it into to a more affordable personal computer, aimed towards the business and education markets. The Apple Macintosh was released in 1984, and was the first personal computer to popularize the GUI and mouse amongst the public.

The company was revived in the 1980s and 1990s, through improvement in quality design and realignment of its product line. Development of digital photocopiers in the 1990s and a revamp of the entire product range—essentially high-end laser printers with attached scanners, known as Multi Function Machines, or just 'MFMs', these were able to be attached to computer networks—again gave Xerox a technical lead over its competitors. Xerox worked to turn its product into a service, providing a complete "document service" to companies including supply, maintenance, configuration, and user support. To reinforce this image, the company introduced a corporate signature, "The Document Company" above its main logo and introduced a red "digital X". The "digital X" symbolized the transition of documents between the paper and digital worlds.

In 2000, Xerox acquired Tektronix color printing and imaging division in Wilsonville, Oregon, for US$925 million. This led to the current Xerox Phaser line of products as well as Xerox solid ink printing technology.

In September 2004, Xerox celebrated the 45th anniversary of the Xerox 914. More than 200,000 units were made around the world between 1959 and 1976, the year production of the 914 was stopped. Today, the 914 is part of American history as an artifact in the Smithsonian Institution.

Xerox's turnaround was largely led by Anne M. Mulcahy, who was appointed president in May 2000, CEO in August 2001 and chairman in January 2002.[8] Mulcahy launched an aggressive turnaround plan that returned Xerox to full-year profitability by the end of 2002, along with decreasing debt, increasing cash, and continuing to invest in research and development.

In November 2006 Xerox completed the Acquisition of XMPie Press Release

In October 2008, Xerox Canada Ltd. was named one of Greater Toronto's Top Employers by Mediacorp Canada Inc., which was announced by the Toronto Star newspaper.[9]

On May 21, 2009, it was announced that Ursula Burns would succeed Anne Mulcahy as CEO of Xerox. On July 1, 2009, Burns became the first African American woman to head a company the size of Xerox.

On September 28, 2009, Xerox announced the intended acquisition of Affiliated Computer Services for $6.4 Billion (the expected acquisition is expected to be completed in the first quarter of 2010). Xerox said it will pay 4.935 Xerox shares and $18.60 cash for each share of ACS, totaling $6.4 billion, or $63.11 a share based on Friday prices.[10]

Chief executives
Name Title Tenure
George C. Seager President 1906 – 1912
Gilbert E. Mosher President 1912 – 1938
Joseph R. Wilson President 1938 – 1946
Joseph C. Wilson President
CEO
1946 – 1966
1961 – 1967
C. Peter McColough CEO 1968 – 1982
David T. Kearns CEO 1982 – July 31, 1990
Paul A. Allaire CEO August 1, 1990 – April 6, 1999
G. Richard Thoman CEO April 7, 1999 – May 10, 2000
Paul A. Allaire CEO May 11, 2000 – July 31, 2001
Anne M. Mulcahy CEO August 1, 2001 – July 1, 2009
Ursula M. Burns CEO July 1, 2009 – present

Current products

Xerox today manufactures and sells a wide variety of office and production equipment including LCD Monitors, photo copiers, Xerox Phaser printers, multifunction printers, large-volume digital printers as well as workflow software under the brand strategy of FreeFlow. The impact of Xerox FreeFlow products on the graphic arts market and the print industry in general has grown exponentially since May 2006, largely as a result of the Xerox presence at IPEX 2006. Xerox also sells scanners and digital presses. On 29 May 2008, Xerox launched the Xerox iGen4 Press.

Xerox sells both color and black and white printers under the Xerox Phaser brand, with the color consumer model starting at US$299; the most expensive color model costs US$6,799.

Xerox also produces fax machines, professional printers, black and white copiers, and several other products.

In addition, Xerox produces many printing and office supplies such as paper, in many forms; and markets software such as Xerox DocuShare, Xerox MarketPort and FlowPort, offers consulting services, ECM Digital Repository Services and printing outsourcing.

Corporate structure

Xerox logo 1971–2008 designed by Chermayeff & Geismar.

Although Xerox is a global brand, it maintains a joint venture, Fuji Xerox, with Japanese photographic firm Fuji Photo Film Co. to develop, produce and sell in the Asia-Pacific region. Fuji Photo Film Co. is currently the majority stakeholder, with 75% of the shareholding.

Xerox India, formerly Modi Xerox, is Xerox's Indian subsidiary derived from a joint venture formed between Dr. Bhupendra Kumar Modi and Rank Xerox in 1983. Xerox obtained a majority stake in 1999 and aims to buy out the remaining shareholders.[11]

Xerox now sponsors the Factory Ducati Team in the World Superbike Championship, under the name of the "Xerox Ducati".

Rank Xerox

Rank Xerox logo used in 1980s

European operations, Rank Xerox, later extended to Asia and Africa, has been fully owned by Xerox Corporation since 1997. The Rank Xerox name was discontinued following the buyout.

Environmental Record

U.S. office workers print an average of 10,000 pages per year. According to Xerox, around 40 percent of the pages printed out by people are only viewed once before being thrown away. Xerox is making attempts at reducing that number with “erasable paper.” This new type of paper is embedded with chemicals that are sensitive to light. When different wavelengths of light touch its surface, the paper darkens, and this in turn gives the “printed text or image” look. The images stay on the paper for between 16 and 24 hours before dissolving, and this allows the paper to be used again in the future.[12]

The average American emits 9.44 tons of carbon dioxide a year.[13] To help offices realize their environmental impact, Xerox released the “sustainability calculator” in late March 2008. The calculator has been created as a method to measure “the environmental benefits so we can use that in our reports and marketing materials” says Patty Calkins, who is the vice president of environment, health, and safety at Xerox, as well as to optimize the office equipment.[14]

Since the 1990s, Xerox, has been an innovator in the domain of the eco-friendly or the green corporation. Its mission statement on the environment states “At Xerox, sustainability is our way of doing business. … We strive to maintain the highest standards to preserve our environment and protect and enhance the health and safety of our employees and communities.” [15] In fact, Xerox has managed to create environmentally friendly products that are also save millions of dollars per year.

In 1993, Xerox created a product stewardship program that began by reprocessing still functioning parts from old office equipment into new parts. This is called the ‘end-of-life take-back program.’ In 1990, Xerox introduced its waste-free packaging system where it created two different extendable boxes that would be used to transport and take back equipment and would then be reprocessed after its life cycle. In 2006, Xerox introduced the re-usable or erasable paper, its biggest innovation yet.

Xerox created a product stewardship program in 1993 whose keystone program was the ‘end-of-life equipment take-back’ program. This program was first developed in Europe. Whenever possible, Xerox would take back machines that it had previously sold to companies and reprocess them into new parts. Previously, companies would specify that new items must be created from 100% new virgin materials. However, Xerox found that equipment that was not useful anymore still had parts that were still functioning. The process was as follows: Xerox would “Carefully dismantle equipment down to the base-unit level and then inspect and clean it in the base-unit-preparation stage. Thorough analysis determines each component’s remaining life. The company reprocesses re-usable components and test them to ensure that they meet Xerox’s standards and puts them back into the same assembly lines as virgin parts.” [16] The company would then test the product thoroughly in an environment that resembles its final location. In 1997, Xerox reprocessed 3.8 million parts from 160,000 pieces of equipment.[17] This process has been emulated over the years by a number of corporations.

Environmental benefits from this process include “an end-of-use collection process for customers, reduction of waste to landfills, the avoidance of raw material purchases and the associated use of energy, and the ability to produce environmentally sound equipment.” [17] As well, parts reprocessing process is labor intensive and Xerox hired 400 additional staff. In addition, net savings totaled over 80$ million in Europe since disposal costs were transformed into revenue.[17] To combat consumer hesitancy in procuring items that are not made from 100% virgin materials, Xerox offered 3 year guarantee on these products made from recycled materials, the same as its completely new materials. “Xerox’s approach was to build customer confidence. For example, Xerox Europe always maintained its focus on total customer satisfaction by combining environmental responsibility with stringent control over manufacturing processes. It offered a total three-year satisfaction guarantee on equipment containing reprocessed parts to demonstrate its confidence in its products, the same as that given on new equipment.”[17]

Finally, Xerox, stopped distinguishing its products as new or built from manufactured parts and promised to have all new products created with both 100% new and manufactured or reprocessed parts.

A second eco-friendly innovation was the waste-free packaging program created in 1990. Xerox created two standard returnable boxes, one steel and one wood, that replace its 25 different disposable packaging boxes. These new, reusable boxes can be reused up to 25 times but were manufactured to last 10 cycles and can be extended to suit past, present and future products. At the end of their life cycle, Xerox will fix the wooden boxes and will reprocess the steel boxes. These totes “reduce disposal costs, increase operational productivity and reduce inventory.” [18] In addition, using re-usable packaging reduces the cost to the consumer by $15 [18] and its estimated annual savings in Europe were approximately $3.5 million.[18] The program has been widely popular.

Xerox most current eco-friendly innovation is its creation of an erasable form of paper for copiers. The product has yet to be released for commercial use but Xerox believes that it may do so in the next few years. Brinda Dalal, an anthropologist at the Xerox Palo Alto Research Center estimates that, “Of the 1,200 pages the average office worker prints per month, 44.5 percent are for daily use – assignments, drafts or e-mail. In her research, scouring the waste produced by office workers, she found that 21 percent of black-and-white copier documents were returned to the recycling bin on the same day they were produced.” [19] That is why Xerox began developing a new technology that would allow paper to become re-usable. The new system produces documents on special yellow paper; the ink has no toner and is a purple tint. The ink then disappears within 16 hours and the process can be hastened by heating the paper. Currently, individual pieces of paper can be printed on up to 50 times but this number is only limited by the paper; if Xerox could create a type of paper that does not lose quality over time, then a paper could then be reprinted on indefinitely. “Xerox has not yet decided whether it will commercialize its technology, … but the goal is to create a system where the specially coated paper costs between two and three times standard copier paper, making the total cost of the system substantially less than conventional paper when paper is reused repeatedly.” [19] The biggest challenge to this new technology will be to find a market. It is very promising and would reduce the amount of deforestation occurring in all the world’s forests by reducing the amount of paper being consumed.

Xerox continues to be an innovator in the areas of reducing waste and reducing the consummation of paper worldwide. It has also been a leader in allowing other companies to follow its lead in a shift to “green consumerism.” The erasable paper is by far its greatest achievement, one that will surely catch on in the future due greater demands from consumers to reduce waste and reduce deforestation by reducing the amount of paper consumed worldwide.

Accounting irregularities

On April 11, 2002, the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission filed a complaint against Xerox.[20] The complaint alleged Xerox deceived the public between 1997 and 2000 by employing several "accounting maneuvers," the most significant of which was a change in which Xerox recorded revenue from copy machine leases – recognizing a "sale" when the period of a lease contract was signed, instead of recognizing revenue notably over the entire length of the contract. At issue was when the revenue was recognized, not the validity of the revenue. Xerox's restatement only changed what year the revenue was stated.

In response to the SEC's complaint, Xerox Corporation neither admitted nor denied wrongdoing. It agreed to pay a $10 million penalty and to restate its financial results for the years 1997 through 2000. On June 5, 2003, six Xerox senior executives accused of securities fraud settled their issues with the SEC and neither admitted nor denied wrongdoing. They agreed to pay $22 million in penalties, disgorgement, and interest.

On January 29, 2003, the SEC filed a complaint against Xerox's auditors [21], KPMG, alleging four partners in the "Big Five" accounting firm permitted Xerox to "cook the books" to fill a $3 billion "gap" in revenue and $1.4 billion "gap" in pre-tax earnings. In April 2005 KPMG settled with the SEC by paying a US$22.48 million fine.[22] As part of the settlement KPMG neither admits nor denies wrongdoing.

During settlement with the Securities and Exchange Commission, Xerox began to revamp itself once more. As a symbol of this transformation, the relative size of the word "Xerox" was increased in proportion to "The Document Company" on the corporate signature and the latter was dropped altogether in September-2004, along with the digital X. However, the digital X and "The Document Company" were still used by Fuji Xerox until April-2008.

Trademark

The word "xerox" is commonly used as a synonym for "photocopy" (both as a noun and a verb) in many areas; for example,"I xeroxed the document and placed it on your desk." or "Please make a xeroxed copy of the articles and hand them out a week before the exam". Though both are common, the company does not condone such uses of its trademark, and is particularly concerned about the ongoing use of Xerox as a verb as this places the trademark in danger of being declared a generic word by the courts. The company is engaged in an ongoing advertising and media campaign to convince the public that Xerox should not be used as a verb.[23][24]

To this end, the company has written to publications that have used Xerox as a verb, and has also purchased print advertisements declaring that "you cannot 'xerox' a document, but you can copy it on a Xerox Brand copying machine". Xerox Corporation continues to protect its trademark diligently in most if not all trademark categories. Despite their efforts, many dictionaries continue to mention the use of "xerox" as a verb, including the Oxford English Dictionary.

In India, Parle Agro's "Kaccha Mango Bite" candy ran a tagline claiming "Kacche Aam Ka Xerox" which means "Xerox of the raw mango". The tag was later modified to "Kacche Aam Ki Copy", which means "Copy of the Raw Mango."

In 2008, Xerox changed its logo to a red sphere with a white X with three grey stripes. The change is meant to reflect less on the photo copying duties Xerox has carried out and instead to refocus on document management and solutions across the world for companies.

Notes

  1. ^ "Online Fact Book: Historical Highlights". www.xerox.com. 2007. http://www.xerox.com/go/xrx/template/019d.jsp?id=Historical&view=Factbook. 
  2. ^ Online Fact Book: Xerox at a Glance, xerox.com. Article retrieved 2006-12-13.
  3. ^ Xerox Hopes Its New Logo Doesn’t Say ‘Copier’, NYT.com. Article retrieved 2008-01-07.
  4. ^ Xerox 914 Plain Paper Copier at americanhistory.si.edu
  5. ^ "Xerox Appoints Chairman and President," New York Times, December 14, 1971.
  6. ^ Smith, Gene. "Xerox Planning to Market Color Copier Next Year." New York Times. May 19, 1972.
  7. ^ Smith, Gene. "Xerox Foresees Profit Record in 1973." New York Times. May 25, 1973; Reckert, Claire M. "Xerox Earnings Set Record." New York Times. July 17, 1974; Reckert, Claire M. "Xerox Earnings Up 5.4% to Record." New York Times. April 16, 1975.
  8. ^ "The Accidental CEO". Fortune. June 2003. http://money.cnn.com/magazines/fortune/fortune_archive/2003/06/23/344603/index.htm. 
  9. ^ "Reasons for Selection, 2009 Greater Toronto's Top Employers Competition". http://www.eluta.ca/top-employer-xerox-canada. 
  10. ^ "Xerox to buy ACS to expand back office services". http://www.reuters.com/article/innovationNews/idUSTRE58R1V120090928. 
  11. ^ "Xerox looks to up stake in Indian arm to 100%". The Economic Times. March 2005. http://economictimes.indiatimes.com/articleshow/1063566.cms. 
  12. ^ http://www.mercurynews.com/realestatenews/ci_9141683 San Jose Mercury News Retrieved May 5. 2008
  13. ^ http://www.fightglobalwarming.com/ccresults.cfm Environmental Defense Fund Retrieved May 5, 2008
  14. ^ http://www.sustainableindustries.com/breakingnews/17977249.html Sustainable Industries Retrieved May 5, 2008
  15. ^ http://www.xerox.com/about-xerox/environment/enus.html
  16. ^ 227: Maslennikova, Irina and David Foley. “Xerox’s Approach to Sustainability.” Interfaces 30:3 (2000) : 226–233.
  17. ^ a b c d 228: Maslennikova, Irina and David Foley. “Xerox’s Approach to Sustainability.” Interfaces 30:3 (2000) : 226–233
  18. ^ a b c 231: Maslennikova, Irina and David Foley. “Xerox’s Approach to Sustainability.” Interfaces 30:3 (2000) : 226–233
  19. ^ a b http://www.nytimes.com/2006/11/27/technology/27xerox.html?_r=1&scp=1&sq=reusable%20paper&st=cse
  20. ^ "SEC v. Xerox Corporation". SEC. 2002. http://www.sec.gov/litigation/complaints/complr17465.htm. 
  21. ^ "Complaint: KPMG LLP et al.". SEC. 2003. http://www.sec.gov/litigation/complaints/comp18389.htm. 
  22. ^ "SEC fines Xerox's ex-auditor". Democrat and Chronicle. April 2005. http://www.democratandchronicle.com/apps/pbcs.dll/article?AID=/20050420/BUSINESS/504200309/1001. 
  23. ^ Stim, Richard (2006). Patent, Copyright & Trademark. Nolo. pp. 388. ISBN 1413301967. 
  24. ^ "Online Fact Book: Overview". http://www.xerox.com/go/xrx/template/019d.jsp?view=Factbook&id=Overview. Retrieved 2007-07-02. 

References

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