Lexmark digitally transforms its service organization and creates new IoT and cloud-powered offerings with Microsoft Azure

Headquartered in Lexington, Kentucky, Lexmark produces printers and imaging products. For more than 20 years, the company has tapped into usage and performance data to manage 1.2 million printers. However, the sheer volume of data and the need to rapidly adapt to market and customer demands meant that Lexmark’s existing systems limited the company from advancing at the pace and scale required. “We needed a solution that provided the flexibility to deliver tailored service offerings to customers while facilitating process standardization and scale,” says Billy Spears, Senior Vice President and Chief Product Delivery Officer at Lexmark. 
 

In updating its system, the Lexmark team wanted to do more than buy a product from a software company. It wanted to build a new platform that would support the company’s identified business goals. As Lexmark began surveying possible solutions, Microsoft stood out for its focus on understanding business needs to develop appropriate technology solutions. “From looking at the marketplace, we felt that Microsoft was doing a better job of understanding enterprise,” says Teresa Willett, Vice President of Information Technology at Lexmark. “I think many technology providers are great at technologies, but Microsoft also seems very focused on being great for a business.”
 

Streamlining nearly 150 business processes and reaching new customers

Lexmark began to revamp its internal systems to improve data sharing and analysis, allowing it to foster quick and informed decision-making, reduce costs, and enhance the customer experience. The company redefined nearly 150 business processes, retired legacy systems, and deployed modern Microsoft Azure technologies through a partnership between business stakeholders, IT, and Microsoft. Lexmark used the streamlined Azure systems and processes to offer advanced services to a broader set of customers, including small and medium-sized businesses (SMBs).  
 

Lexmark uses Azure IoT capabilities to connect and manage any device, no matter what network environment it finds itself in. From splintered franchise locations to large, multinational retailers to small, local businesses, Lexmark’s devices use Azure’s Internet of Things (IoT) to operate cloud-natively right out of the box, and the devices are network agnostic, which is crucial for its ongoing mission of simplifying the customer experience and allowing print from anywhere. 
 

“Azure’s full-suite approach matched Lexmark’s own end-to-end technology ownership model and had been key to us delivering scalable enterprise-class print solutions into the SMB space,” says Phil Carter, Senior Director of Global Portfolio Management at Lexmark. “We essentially deliver IoT-powered print via the cloud, which Azure was built to provide.” 
 

Reducing call center handling time by 25 percent and improving technician efficiency by 20 percent with Azure

Deploying the new Azure-based solution brought immediate benefits for Lexmark internally, its customers, and its bottom line. Armed with granular customer data and a more intuitive, easy-to-use system, agent handling time in call centers has been reduced by 25 percent. Service dispatch routes are optimized using dynamic logic that accounts for the best geographical route, urgency of the issue, timing of the service call, and conformance to customer-specific service-level agreements. Technician visits can be also intelligently batched together using AI-driven predictive modeling. These support capabilities have driven a 20 percent improvement in technician efficiency. 
 

With its sales and services operations using the same Azure cloud-based services, Lexmark achieved a 360-degree view of its customers. Its support agents used this extensively to improve the customer experience, ultimately remotely resolving 70 percent of all customer issues. Further using this 360-degree visibility, Lexmark launched a new analytics service called the Lexmark Customer Governance Portfolio (CGP), which empowers enterprises to assess their entire print environment holistically or to drill down to individual print devices. Customers use these analytics to identify business process outliers and cost-saving opportunities, among other benefits. “The CGP led to about a 20 percent improvement in customer satisfaction surveys,” says Spears. 
 

Lexmark also uses Azure AI technology, such as Azure Cognitive Services, to build remote fleet management capabilities for partners. What used to be only available to enterprise customers is now available to multiple partner categories through Lexmark Cloud Fleet Management and Lexmark Managed Print Services Express offerings.

Partners can remotely manage devices, change settings, upgrade firmware, access workflow solutions, and monitor device statuses. This cloud-based management solution also provides partners with access to advanced capabilities, such as predictive service and proactive consumables management.  
 

Creating new commercial applications and increasing contractual and recurring revenue to 40 percent

Lexmark’s holistic approach to modernizing its internal system and the immediate results have paved the way for revenue growth. In fact, 40 percent of Lexmark’s revenue is now contractual or recurring. The team at Lexmark also realized that the IoT- and cloud-based solution it had developed using Azure and other Microsoft technology could be applied to any connected device, from industrial equipment to medical devices. 
 

“We recognized that the capabilities we built for our digital transformation could also be deployed to customers to solve a different type of problem than we’ve focused on in the past,” says Vishal Gupta, Global Chief Technology Officer, Chief Information Officer, and Senior Vice President of Connected Technology at Lexmark. The company commercialized Lexmark IoT Solutions, a growing suite of industry-specific offerings that include edge computing technology, IoT solutions, application accelerators, and consulting services that help customers achieve rapid results.
 

In preparing itself for the future of work, Lexmark addressed a business need and opened the doors to far-reaching applications. “With this Microsoft partnership, we have been able to digitally transform our approach to services while creating new IoT and cloud-powered offerings, including ones outside print,” says Gupta. “It’s been a powerful combination, with measurable results, that has uniquely positioned Lexmark for success.”