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Douglas Coupland and the panel of experts had set up the problems with the future of work, and now it was up to Konica Minolta to lay out its solution, which began with President and CEO Shoei Yamana. He reiterated some of the themes presented in the keynote and panel, such as the broadening of where and when work could take place, and the globalisation of teams. Yamana argued that user experience was key to this, rather than merely technology, just as it was when he was designing cameras decades earlier.
Some nicel executed projection mapping was followed by the BIG REVEAL of the product that was actually being launced at Spotlight Live – the Konica Minolta Workplace Hub. This emerged from the floor in a haze of dry ice, like a stage entrance from Lady Gaga. The Workplace Hub is designed to be a central platform for enabling the activities of work, including emerging technologies such as AI and IoT.
Surprise, surprise, considering Konica Minolta's core business, the initial Workplace Hub, to be launched in autumn 2017, is an integrated multi-function printer with added features. However, there will be a rack-mounted appliance without the printer functionality available at the same time.
The sexy device that emerged within a halo of smoke from the ground wasn't going to arrive until spring 2018. But Yamana didn't provide many details about what the Workplace Hub would actually do.
The detail was left to Dennis Curry, head of Business Innovation and R&D at Konica Minolta, but it was still somewhat opaque. The platform was going to provide managed IT services, such as a hybrid cloud platform, with centralised system security and data protection, plus a conferencing hub with AI. The question was, do people want to buy these kinds of services built into their printer, and what was Konica Minolta's unique capability in this area compared to vendors providing managed IT services, like HP and IBM?
Rick Taylor, President and CEO, USA, also provided his enthusiasm to the launch. He had explained the Workplace Hub to his 87-year-old father, a self-made millionaire, who was enthusiastic about how you could run an entire Enterprise Resource Planning system on it. There was some implication that AI would arrive in the future to enhance this functionality, but it wasn't there yet. So the Workplace Hub isn't as earth shattering as its billing implied just yet.
