InfoPrint Solutions: IBM collaborating with Ricoh on printers

InfoPrint Solutions: IBM collaborating with Ricoh on printers

US based tech giant IBM has said that they are entering into collaboration with Japanese company Ricoh. This would be the first step taken by the company to divest another of its technology-hardware operations.

IBM aims to sell a majority stake in its printing-systems division to Japan’s Ricoh.

Ricoh would be paying IBM a total of $725 million in cash to acquire a 51% stake in this joint venture company to be called InfoPrint Solutions Co.

Ricoh would then takeover the rest of the company from IBM in the coming years.

IBM Chief Executive Sam Palmisano said in a statement that this deal would enable them to continue to refine its focus on its strategic businesses. This printer division generated $1 billion in revenue in 2006 for the company.

Interestingly, IBM has already sold off their PC division to Lenovo and their hard disk-drive business to Hitachi Data Systems.