 Seiko Epson Corporation (????????????, Seiko Epuson Kabushiki-gaisha?), or Epson, is a Japanese company and one of the world's largest manufacturers of inkjet, dot matrix and laser printers, scanners, timepieces (through their famous Seiko division), desktop computers, business, multimedia and home theatre projectors, large home theatre televisions, robots and industrial automation equipment, point of sale docket printers and cash registers, laptops, integrated circuits, LCD components and other associated electronic components. Based in Nagano prefecture, Japan, they have numerous subsidiaries worldwide. The current CEO is Saburo Kusama. Net sales over 2004/2005 amounted to ¥1.479 trillion.
Daiwa Kogyo, Ltd. was founded in 1942 by Hisao Yamazaki in Suwa, Nagano. The company was backed by an investment from K. Hattori & Co., Ltd. (presently Seiko Corporation) and Daini Seikosha Co., Ltd. (presently Seiko Instruments Inc.) and began as a manufacturer of watch parts. It started operation in a 2,500 square-foot renovated miso storehouse with 22 employees. In 1943 Daini Seikosha established a factory in Suwa for manufacturing Seiko watches with Daiwa Kogyo. In 1959 Suwa Factory of Daini Seikosha was split off and marged with Daiwa Kogyo to form Suwa Seikosha Co., Ltd. The company has developed and commercialized many timepiece technologies. In particular, it developed the world's first portable quartz timer (Seiko QC-951) in 1963, the world's first quartz watch (Seiko Quartz Astron 35SQ) in 1969, the world's first automatic power generating quartz watch (Seiko Auto-Quartz) in 1988 and the Spring Drive watch movement in 1999. Manufacturing watches still constitutes one of the major businesses of Seiko Epson. The watches made by the company are sold through the Seiko Watch Corporation, a subsidiary of Seiko Corporation.
In 1961 Shinshu Seiki Co., Ltd. was established as a subsidiary of Suwa Seikosha to supply precision parts for SEIKO watches. When the Seiko Group was selected to be the official time keeper for the Tokyo Olympic games in 1964 a printing timer was required to time events, and Shinshu Seiki started development of an electronic printer. In September 1968, Shinshu Seiki launched the world's first miniprinter, the EP-101, which was soon incorporated into many calculators. In June 1975, the name Epson was coined after the next generation of the EP-101 was released to the public ("Son of EP-101" became "Son of EP" which in turn became "Epson"). In April of the same year Epson America Inc. was established to sell printers for Sinshu Seiki Co.
Epson MX-80 dot matrix printerIn June 1978, the TX-80 eighty-column dot-matrix printer was released to the market, and was mainly used as a system printer for the Commodore PET Computer. After two years of further development, an improved model, the MX-80, was launched in October 1980. This was soon the best selling printer in the United States.
In July 1982, Shinshu Seiki officially named itself the Epson Corporation and launched the world's first handheld computer, the HX-20 (HC-20), and in May 1983 the world's first portable color LCD TV was developed and launched by the company.
In November 1985, the Suwa Seikosha Co., Ltd. and the Epson Corporation merged to form the Seiko Epson Corporation.
In June 2003, the company became public following their listing on the 1st section of the Tokyo Stock Exchange (TYO: 6724 ). As of 2006, the Hattori family (founder of Seiko Corp, Seiko Instruments and Seiko Epson) and its related individuals and companies are still major shareholders of Seiko Epson and have the power[1].
In 2004 Epson introduced their digital rangefinder camera, the Epson R-D1, which takes Leica M mount lenses and Leica screw mount lenses with an adapter ring. This camera is notable for being the first digital rangefinder on the market. Because its sensor is smaller than the standard 35 mm film frame for which the lenses it takes are designed, lenses mounted on the R-D1 have the field of view of a lens 1.53 times as long as their stated focal length would have on a standard 35mm camera. As of 2006 the R-D1 has been replaced with its successor, the R-D1s. The R-D1s is available for a more modest price, however the hardware of both cameras is identical. Epson has released a firmware patch to bring the R-D1 up to the full functionality of its successor - the first digital camera manufacturer to make such an upgrade available for free.
[edit]
Consumables
Epson Stylus Photo inkjet printer, a siginificant milestone in Seiko Epson history introduced in 1997In recent years, Epson has been accused of manufacturing expensive consumables for their printers. It is also said that the company is forcing customers to purchase replacement ink cartridges before they are truly spent by using 'intelligence chips' to count how many pages have been printed in order to estimate the remaining ink, without actually monitoring the true ink levels.
One disgruntled customer Bob Powell ([1]), claims to have dismantled an apparently empty ink tank from his Epson printer and found over 2 milliliters of ink remaining in the tank (25% of the original capacity).
In July 2003, A Dutch Consumer Association advised its 640,000 members to boycott Epson ink jet printers. The Netherlands-based organization alleged that Epson customers were unfairly charged for ink they could never use. Later that month however, the group retracted its call for a nationwide boycott of Epson products and issued a statement conceding that residual ink left in Epson cartridges is necessary for the printers to function properly. (PC World Friday, October 24, 2003 [2]).
Epson leaves ink in the cartridges (and in fact have done so ever since they developed the piezo-electric head) due to the way the capping mechanism works. If the capping mechanism dries out, then the heads risk getting clogged, and thus an expensive repair will be necessary. The reason that the Dutch Consumer Association retracted their statement was because it was pointed out that Epson actually states how many pages (at usually a 5% coverage of an A4 sheet of paper) each cartridge can print. Further tests revealed that Epson did not mislead consumers.
Nonetheless, Epson America, Inc. has decided to settle a class action lawsuit brought before the Los Angeles Superior Court. It does not admit guilt, but they have agreed to refund $45 to anyone who purchased an Epson InkJet Printer after 4/8/99 (at least $20 of which must be used at Epson's E-Store). www.epsonsettlement.com
Because many new Epson printers use an individual cartridge for each color as opposed to grouping all the colors in one cartridge, this system can save a user money because you do not have to discard the entire cartridge just because one color is empty. In the end, it is up to the printer's user to determine if the separate color cartridge system is better for them or not.
|
