HP Pan India Case Study

Competition
Launch date-27thAugust, 2021

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 Analytics Case Study (Print)
HP Inc

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 BUSINESS INSIGHTS ON A NEWLY LAUNCHED PRODUCT
•Company A has been the Industry leader in its segment- printing. Printing is a mature industry especially in the Consumer, Small & Medium Business (SMB) and
Enterprise segments. Industry differentiation is technology driven with 8-10 major players dominating the print industry. The industry is channel driven with sales
usually driven by Channel partners across markets worldwide. The Consumer printing industry operates on a similar model to shaving razors – or the ‘razor and
blade’ business model. Revenue is driven through a one-time sale of Print Hardware (the Printer) and sales of Supplies (Ink cartridges & Toner) through the life of
the printer. Company A and majority of its competitors have been exploring potential alternatives to this existing busines model. Profitability of the busines is
across the lifetime of the printer and dependent on both the usage of the printer as well as sales of original supplies. There have been several challenges to this
business model - remanufactured cartridges, unauthorised refills and fake cartridges have been a challenge to profitability.

•The industry has always been channel driven with minimal connect to the end consumer. This has presented a challenge considering that profitability is driven by
original supplies usage. With minimal information on customer preferences and behaviour, profitability is at risk across the industry. Company A has been one of
the leading proponents of digital transformation and understanding the end consumer. It began rolling out mobile / desktop applications which allow customization
of the printer and the print experience and offered solutions which streamline and enhance the print experience. They were also the pioneer of introducing an
uninterrupted printing experience – a subscription service where ink cartridges are home delivered to the end consumer. The customer signs up on a monthly print
plan based on their printing needs and the company handles shipping of the cartridges to drive an uninterrupted print experience.

•Company A also introduced a new cloud based printing solution which allows the customer flexibility to choose how they want their print experience to be.

• They could choose the traditional model:

a) Buy Hardware from Channel partners or directly from Company A exclusive stores or its website
b) Buy Supplies as and when needed

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 The new cloud based printing solution. For this case study, we will refer to this as A+ model

A) Buy hardware from channel partners or directly from Company A exclusive stores or its website
B) Avail free ink/toner supplies for 6 months
C) Avail enhanced warranty with the A+ model
D) Avail usage of cloud solutions and applications which ease the print experience like smart printing shortcuts and enhanced scan experience
E) To avail these benefits, the customer requires an A+ account, Internet connection and use of original Company A ink or toner for the lifetime of the printer

The cloud based printing solution A+ was launched in the U.S. across major retail Chains. 2 inkjet printer platforms and one Laser printer platform were part
of the initial launch. Multiple printer SKUs were available under each of these 3 printer platforms. These 3 platforms primarily cater to a moderate to heavy
users and are frequently bought by SOHO and SMB customers along with some consumers. The deployment of the cloud based printing solution A+ is done
through a user centric cloud infrastructure system built for the A+ rollout.

Company A has been monitoring the traditional sales metrics including product returns to monitor the performance of the A+ rollout, apart from the traditional
metrics, A+ adoption is also a key metric to understand the success of the A+ program.

Post launch, an intriguing trend was noted by analysts on the A+ program. The adoption of 1 SKU under one the platforms - which has 3 SKUs - was way
lower than its peers even though the overall sales of that SKU was very healthy. The product specifications were the same for all the 3 SKUs under that
platform except that the colour of that SKU was different. This SKU had a new colour which the company had introduced for the first time in this segment.
Company A would like to know if there is a problem with this SKU or if there are any other factors which are driving the lower adoption for this SKU.

Your firm has been hired by company A to consult with them to address this problem. There is a lot riding on the A+ program for company A. A successful
launch of this program will give them a sustainable competitive advantage over its competitors and will also enhance company A’s belief that a deeper
understanding of customer behaviour is critical in the digital economy.

You have access to the following data sets which company A has shared with you. All these data sets have been gathered with appropriate customer consent
as required by European Union (EU) and California privacy laws. All the data sets are masked and tagged accordingly.

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 A) Customer reviews done by a 3 rd party organization with linking keys
B) SKU wise sales data across channels
C) Customer Support call notes for the low adoption SKU
D) Customer print usage details – post purchase signup to the A+ program, Traditional & A+ program Printer usage details. (This data is at an individual
printer level reported monthly. Each row of data is the usage of the printer attributable to that month). The ‘days_since_last_snapshot’ metric implies how
many days have passed since the last snapshot of the usage information was recorded. The ‘print_volume_since_last_snapshot’ metric implies the
amount of usage since the last snapshot. Think of this as the meter readings for calculating our electricity consumption at home.

E) Printer returns data

F) Pricing details & product specifications for the Traditional & A+ printers
G) Printer Setup and A+ program adoption information (if a printer serial number appears in this data it means that the printer tried to set up using the
recommended method. If the customer viewed the offer screen, it means they encountered no software errors. If the customer neither accepted nor
declined the offer. it means they did not take a decision on opting in for the A+ program)

Additional Note:

The entire data set being shared may contain data for many different printers. However, the 3 SKUs that belong to same printer platform and are the subject
of this case study have the following product numbers:

43e27a4552ba15b49fffad0cf199a94a

efcf732ba481e52c1635f4264a20df5f

afad3b4f2a719ca310982fbd15dce5d4
You are expected to come up with your findings using these data sources. You can also do some secondary research of your own to come up with
your insights which you could potentially triangulate with the data. Please mention the research sources you have used and all the assumptions
you have made.

H) Good luck on helping company A’s management with insights which could help them address the low adoption of the SKU in question.

I) Disclaimer: The case details and the data shared for this case study are hypothetical in nature. The data is masked and anonymized to give the participants of the case
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study an opportunity to put themselves in a realistic business scenario.
 Thanks