Xerox 9700 was launched 40 years ago and is the forefather of the digital printing industry.
The company recently celebrated the birthday of the first commercial laser printer designed by Xerox engineer Gary Starkweather and the 9700 also transformed office printing which have had years of laser printers and MFPs at their disposal.
KeyPoint Intelligence credited the 9700 as the “ product that heralded the third wave of industrial automation (computer-driven printers) after steam-powered presses in the early 1800s and electric-powered presses later that century”.
Jeff Hayes, Managing Director, KeyPoint Intelligence, said: “The Xerox 9700 helped usher in the wave of computer-driven automation in the 1970s that transformed offices, data centers, copy departments, and ultimately, the printing industry around the world. Much of how we communicate in hard copy today can be traced back to this remarkable product.”
The success of the 9700 generated $1billion (€0.88 billion) regularly in annual revenues and in the 10 years after its launch it was the “printing press of choice” for bills, statements and credit cards, banks and utilities and it was the fastest printer of its kind printing high volumes.
Steve Hoover, Chief Technology Officer, Xerox, commented: “The laser printer is arguably the greatest invention made in a Xerox research centre. The 9700 was the first in a long line of iconic products that were made possible by Gary Starkweather’s invention, including DocuTech and today’s iGen family.”
After 20 years the 9700 was “retired” in 1997 however much of its capabilities are still seen today such as printing speeds of up to 120ppm, duplex printing, cut sheet paper, standard resolution of 300dpl and the ability to print graphics. This innovative machine also personalised documents and could be fitted with Magnetic Ink Character Recognition (MICR) toner “for printer checks”.
Starkweather who invented laser and the 9700 was inducted into the National Inventors Hall of Fame in 2012 and while he is retired he said that he knew his invention would have a significant impact but was not sure what that would be. “A real question was raised at the time about the future of paper and how the printer would survive into the future with people using novel displays and so on. Some 40 years later, laser printers are still going strong,” Starkweather said.
Xerox continues to innovate and launch laser printers and recently released 29 new Xerox ConnectKey enabled printers and MFPs.