Kyocera

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A cAse study of best prActice in the integrAtion of mAteriAls technology And design to improve innovAtion

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“What I would like to see is outcome-

based tenders whereby a target is given

to us or other manufacturers, and we can

provide really innovative solutions.”

tracey rawling church,

Kyocera Document Solutions (UK) Ltd

consortium

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best prActice in mAteriAls And design best prActice in mAteriAls And design

Dr Kazuo Inamori

FoundationsKyocera was founded by dr Kazuo

inamori in 1959 as Kyoto ceramics, and

is now a global corporation employing

over 71,000 people and operating in

many business sectors - from telecoms

to dental implants - but all driven by

ceramic technologies.

Kyocera’s headquarters are in Kyoto,

Japan and having invested in its own r&d

facilities and manufacturing factories,

it can control the entire product

development process, including sourcing

of raw materials and the integration of

hardware, consumables and software.

Kyocera also have a policy of working

with ‘best in class’ software developers

so that rather than reinventing a viable

existing software solution they may

license and sell it under their own brand,

or promote it as ‘Kyocera recommended’.

this innomatnet case study focuses on

the document imaging division, which

accounts for about 20% of Kyocera

revenues.

corporate motto

Respect the Divine and Love People

Preserve the spirit to work fairly and

honorably, respecting people, our work,

our company and our gobal community.

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WHY SUSTAINABILITY is important to Kyocera innoVationKyocera’s deep-rooted corporate

philosophy of “harmonious co-existence

with people and planet” and “doing the

right thing as a human being” is based

on buddhist values and has naturally

led to the company taking a sustainable

approach to all its activities. It believes

that business exists to serve society and

that profit is its reward for doing that.

this philosophy, and how it can be

applied in daily business, is annually

discussed at central and local workshops

and seminars attended by all Kyocera

staff. It is believed to have led to

unusually long-term retention of staff

whose personal values coincide those

of the business, as well as a high level of

trust among partner businesses.

management RATIoNALeTo provide opportunities for the

material and intellectual growth of all

our employees, and through our joint

efforts, contribute to the advancement

of society and humankind.

management PHILoSoPHYTo coexist harmoniously with nature and

society. Harmonious coexistence is the

underlying foundation of all our business

activities as we work together to create

a world of abundance and peace.

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driVers For innoVation part of the Kyocera culture is to always

be looking to make products which are

better, more sustainable, even if this

means sometimes operating outside

the commercial mainstream and not

following the existing market. For

example, it took 15 years before the

innovative ceramic photocopier drum

technology could be promoted on its

sustainability benefits rather than a total

cost of ownership argument.

Kyocera’s biggest challenge was to

encourage organisations to think

holistically about the cost of running

a printer, so that they understood that

any initial price premium was worth

paying for the operational benefit

of reduced consumables costs and

machine downtime.

innoVation in oFFice printing productsin 1992 Kyocera discovered a way of

applying their expertise in ceramics to

create an exceptionally long life laser

printer drum. This led to a substantial

reduction in parts needing disposal

once machines ran out of toner, and to

increased reliability.

Conventional laser printers use a drum

made of a soft organic photoconductor

material. this is very good at holding the

magnetic charge that takes the toner and

transfers it to the paper, but the action of

paper rapidly abrades the surface leading

to frequent replacement.

Kyocera decided to use an amorphous

silicon which is as hard as sapphire and

unaffected by the friction of the paper.

the majority of rollers and other parts

then were designed to be permanently

built-in to the printer, and not included in

the consumable ink powder cartridge.

Amorphous Silicon (A-Si) drums, as used in

Kyocera printers and mulitfunction copiers.

Kyocera drums last many times longer

than the drums in cartridge-based

machines, reducing the environmental

impact and financial cost of printing.

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best prActice in mAteriAls And design

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Its first generation ‘Ecosys’ printers

lasted for 300,000 pages, compared

with a 10,000 page drum life in

standard laser printers, which needed

to have their integrated metal and

plastic drum components replaced

each time, with 47 million now going

into land fill every year.

Current Kyocera ‘lifetime’ models can

last for up to a million pages and have

evolved to cope with the higher speeds

needed by customers, and consequent

demands on the drum technology,

while reducing replaceable items to a

simple toner container with entirely

plastic parts.

q The ‘toner’ cartridge in a typical

cartridge-based machine cantains over 60

parts made from numerous materials. These

are replaced every time the toner runs out.

Such cartridges are complex to recycle.

p A Kyocera toner cassette contains

just 5 parts made of 2 types of plastic.

Such cassettes are easily recycled by a

UK partner.

R & D PHILoSoPHY BASeD oN LoNG LIFe TeCHNoLoGYthe ecosys printer design was based

on economy and ecology being in

balance. ecosys has evolved into a r &

d framework through which products

are designed to offer maximum user

economy, minimum environmental

impact and easier integration with

customers’ existing network systems.

As part of this, life cycle analysis is

carried out on every new product

and compared with its predecessor,

while products are designed for simple

disassembly with minimum use of metal

fixings and process identity coding on all

plastic components.

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WorKing WitH outside partners to innoVate in SUSTAINABILITYhaving an internal sustainable agenda

is not enough, and Kyocera believe it is

important to look outside for ideas and

other people’s perspectives if its core

philosophy is to be turned into practical

innovation of new products and services.

The UK subsidiary’s relationships with

organisations such as The Green

Alliance and forum for the future

are therefore very much about

innovation. They enable

tracey rawling church and

her colleagues to meet and

explore solutions with people

facing similar challenges, yet

in completely different industries.

Kyocera green card netWorKWhile Kyocera spent many years

marketing its products on cost

of ownership rather than their

environmental credentials, they

occasionally came across organisations

and individuals who were receptive

to a sustainable message.

their ‘green card network’ was

established in 2000 as a small, non-

commercial community of interest for

those people, becoming one of the

UK’s first ‘green’ professional networks

in the uK. it grew to a membership of

4,000 from universities to small design

agencies, with regular events to share

best eco-practice and learn about

opportunities to improve sustainability.

With the subsequent mainstreaming

of sustainability in industry, there was

no longer a need for the green card

network, but Kyocera believe that its

pioneering work had several benefits:

• sharing knowledge and experiences

about making sustainable business a

reality

• Creating a reputation for Kyocera as

a supplier that was serious about

sustainable office practice

• Bringing a diverse external perspective

and provoking new ways of thinking.

thegreencard.org.uk

Green CardNetwork

print

copy

scan

fax

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Forum For tHe Future forum for the future works with

members such as Kyocera uK to

understand and develop ‘best practice’

learnings on sustainability for the benefit

of the wider business community,

interviewing executives, channel

partners, and customers.

they recently started exploring the trend

towards consumption-based supply of

products, and particularly why this has

worked in some industry sectors but

not others. for example, Kyocera are

leaders in a movement towards managed

document services, whereby the customer

may never own the hardware but instead

contracts delivery of agreed service levels,

including monitoring of usage patterns

and early alerts for engineering calls.

by contrast, carpet supplier interface

was unsuccessful in its move from

selling to leasing carpets despite

taking responsibility for replacement/

refurbishment to an agreed standard.

early insights from the forum are that

corporate budgeting, and the way

people are managed, motivated and

remunerated, makes it difficult for them

to buy products on a consumption-based

model. It doesn’t fit with their internal

systems and, according to Kyocera, can

only be solved over time by advising

customers on the financial and carbon-

saving benefits and collaborating on the

(gradual) adaptation of new systems.

This effectively means shifting from

a pure product supplier to offering a

procurement consultancy role, and

Kyocera now have a professional services

division for that purpose.

In another example of the benefits of

their ethical values, Kyocera rely on the

trust of their third party dealers to jointly

introduce the consumption-based model

to customers, and discover tailor-made

solutions for them.

Kyocera and other forum for the future

members find that government invitations

to tender are usually for supply to a very

specific hardware specification (e.g. 500

printers of x resolution) rather than being

based on an understanding of customers’

actual needs. And that while questions

about life cycle analysis, carbon footprint

etc. will influence short-listing, decisions

are invariably made on price.

This makes it difficult for companies like

Kyocera to innovate and provide better

solutions to government, while a similar

request from the private sector might

lead to imaginative ideas for reducing

paper consumption.

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What Kyocera propose instead is an

outcome-based tender system for the

public sector, e.g. ‘provide a solution

to reduce print costs by 50% and

energy consumption by 40%’. They

believe this procurement model would

drive industry innovation, save costs,

improve efficiency and reduce carbon

emissions faster. it could also have

applications in many industries – not

just imaging - particularly information

and communications technology.

such a system would need to include

funding for initial fact-finding to discover

customer needs, but the outcomes would

ultimately cost less to own and operate

due to the efficiencies that could be built

in. they believe it would succeed because

it removes boundaries to innovation and

satisfying customer needs.

Knowledge transfer networks (Ktns)

could be an important channel for

such initiatives. For Kyocera, successful

Ktn involvement is about a genuine

desire to learn, improve and grow as

an organisation through contact with

likeminded organisations. In an echo of

the company’s founding philosophy, they

feel that while KTN activity can sometimes

lead to commercial opportunities, this

should not be the main aim.

THe GReeN ALLIANCe - DeSIGNING FoR THe CIRCULAR eCoNomYWhile Kyocera consciously design for

end-of-life dismantling of components etc,

they recognise this is entirely dependent

on the availability of local reprocessing

infrastructure, and are seeking solutions

to the current gaps as contributors to the

green Alliance taskforce on the circular

Economy. In addition to Kyocera, members

include boots plc, eef the manufacturer’s

Organisation and WRAP.

the green Alliance is a think tank which

engages business and policy makers to (a)

benefit from the innovation that’s already

taken place in technology, and (b) improve

sustainability as part of the drive towards

a ‘circular economy’. this means that

instead of a linear progression from raw

materials – to product – to use – to waste,

in a circular economy resources remain

which can be re-used or recycled.

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BLUe ANGeL LABeL – SUSTAINABLe accreditation in europe Kyocera have also been invited to

collaborate in joint marketing of the long-

established ‘blue Angel’ sustainability

accreditation, which is backed by the

german department of the environment.

this will be an opportunity to test if the

programme can have a international as

well as local impact.

BeneFits oF CoLLABoRATIoN oN SUSTAINABILITYBy actively participating in initiatives like forum for the future, the green Alliance and Blue Angel accreditation, Kyocera UK are able to keep their R&D offices in Japan updated with the latest european legislation and thinking on sustainability and how to deal with products at end of

life – potentially influencing both product design and business model formation.

For instance:

• Should there be a global distribution and re-use infrastructure?

• Which, if any, parts should return to the factory at end of life, and which should go to regional reprocessing hubs?

• What are the intellectual property implications?

• is this something the company should arrange independently, or in collaboration with industry partners?.

ReGIoNAL FeedBacK into r&d and designKyocera takes full advantage of its

worldwide distribution network,

enabling european product managers

to give region-specific feedback about

customer requirements, local price

positioning, competitor strategy etc.

to its Japan-based r&d and design

teams. this includes bi-annual face-

to-face meetings in Japan as well as

regular electronic contact.

Also informing this feedback loop,

their european sustainability Work

Group collects information about

the legislative road map, customer

demands around sustainability and any

interesting local competitor initiatives.

increasingly these approaches are part

of an integrated systems approach

which involves active engagement

with stakeholders from business

customers and eu legislators to third

party dealers and resellers.

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The company’s relatively open culture

makes it easier for staff to inform

Head Office or subsidiaries if they feel

something can be done better or in a

different way, though the challenges

of communicating across continents,

languages and cultures should not

be under-estimated, and are key to

successful international innovation.

having a senior Japanese general

manager based in the uK has

recently improved understanding of

local markets and communications

considerably, because he is able to

act as a bridge – expressing the UK

perspective directly to colleagues in

Japan and vice versa.


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interVieWeeTracey Rawling ChurchTracey Rawling Church is a marketing specialist who joined Kyocera uK in 1993, having been attracted by its sustainable printer technology and ethical business values. her current role as head of corporate social responsibility (csr) is focused on developing sustainability strategies for business–to–business product marketing. She is a regular contributor to seminars and conferences on sustainability and CSR topics, a 10:10 pioneer and a member of both the reading climate change partnership and the thames valley berkshire lep sme Action Group.

“A global network that constantly strives

to earn the trust of our customers in

every aspect of business from technology

development to support.”

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Best practice in materials and design Best practice in materials and design

DISCLAImeRthis report forms part of the

deliverables from the innomatnet

project which has received funding from

the european commission’s seventh

framework programme fp7/2007-2013

under grant agreement n° 290583. the

report reflects only the author’s views

and the european commission is not

liable for any use that might be made of

the content of this publication.

the project runs from the 1 April 2012

to 30 September 2014. It involves

eleven partners and is coordinated by

sociedade portuguesa de inovação (spi).

More information on the project can be

found at www.innomatnet.eu

the lead contractor for the case studies

was InnoMatNet consortium partner

the Institute of Materials, Minerals

and mining, with delivery through

the materials and design exchange

(made), a group within the uK materials

Knowledge transfer network.

www.iom3.org.uk

www.materialsktn.net/made

© innomatnet 2013 Images pp. 2, 3, 5, 6, 7, 8, 10, 11, 17, 19 © Kyocera

ACKNoWLeDGemeNTSWe are grateful to the following individuals and organisations for their contribution to the InnoMatNet case studies: tracey rawling church, Kyocera Document Solutions (UK) Ltd

Case study suggestions taken from the InnoMatNet survey. Reviewed by: Claire Claessen and John Conti-Ramsden, Chemistry Innovation KTNJohn Bound, The Institute of Materials, Minerals & Mining (MaDE, Materials KTN)

Research & editing: John Bound, The Institute of Materials, Minerals & Mining (MaDE, Materials KTN)

Graphic design: Lara Collins, The Institute of Materials, Minerals & Mining

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Best practice in materials and design

contact

KYoCeRA Document Solutions

(UK) Limited

eldon court, 75-77 london road,

reading, rg1 5bs, england

www.kyoceradocumentsolutions.co.uk

Documents

Kyocera