The OEM has made the move “as part of a drive to accelerate business in the Asia Pacific”.
The new company, Ricoh Korea Co., Ltd., will be a 100 percent Ricoh-owned sales company based in Seoul, but will move from “sales of production print business lines” to “office MFPs, printers and solutions” in the “near future”.
According to the OEM’s press release, the reasoning for the establishment of Ricoh Korea is down to the fact that “currently, the Korea branch of Ricoh Production Print Solutions Japan […] conducts production print business in Korea”, and the OEM is now aiming to “utilize its business assets and enhance them” by transferring them to Ricoh Korea.
The Japanese production print company at this time “handles continuous form printers and a solutions business”, and Ricoh Korea will add “cut sheet printers” to its business lines. As well as this, the addition of resources will allow the Korean subsidiary to “offer one-stop solutions to customers and conduct more efficient marketing and sales in Korea”.
Other information given by Ricoh at this time include that the President of the new subsidiary is Haruhisa Sakai, and that the staff head count of the business will be 50 people in the first year.