HP's CloudPrint is worth the paper it's printed on

SINGAPORE: Working on this piece of write-up digitally in a chauffeur-driven car is one thing. But printing the file remains a challenge if you are on the move, away from office and home.

Hewlett-Packard has come up with a solution that boasts of addressing this problem. Today you can print anything from anywhere. It���s possible to give a print command in Europe with your kin taking the printout in Asia, instantly. It���s just a click away to print documents from miles away, thanks to researchers at HP Labs, Bangalore, who have developed a new printing technology that makes this possible.

The IT giant has invented ���Cloud-Print��� technology, which allows users to print from a BlackBerry remotely by using any printer. It is a Cloud and web-services-based technology that provides mobile users the ability to easily print documents, presentations, reports and photos at the nearest network printer, in the office, at home or on the road.

Cloud is an industry jargon that often refers to Internet. The service is printer agnostic and driverless, and requires simple Internet access via your mobile phone. The vision of HP CloudPrint is to make printing easy, make printers ubiquitous and create a market place for printing.

���Even if you make the most fantastic printers in the world, but if you are not able to take a print, if you can���t print relevant documents in time in an easy manner, it���s not worth it. HP owns some 40 plus market share in printers and makes amazing printing machines, but if not many people are able to print to those printers, it is of no value,��� said the Principal, Office of Imaging and Printing Group, Chief Technology Officer, HP, Sridhar Solur.

He was addressing the media during a technology meet in Singapore from London via the HP Halo, which is a state-of-the-art telepresence solution that brings meeting attendees from around the globe into an environment that feels as if they are in the same boardroom. The two-day HP meet on ���Innovation for work and play��� concluded on July 28.
HP and Research in Motion (RIM) are planning to bring ubiquitous mobile printing to customers through CloudPrint for BlackBerry.

���It���s important to make printers ubiquitous. For example, devices are mobile, but printers are not. But the way is to find a printer available wherever you are. I can���t be bothered to carry a laptop while travelling, but why would I love to take a printer along with me,��� Solur elaborated.

He also touched upon the difficulties to print a document while on-the-go. ���See while travelling it is virtually impossible to get a print-out. You have to plead to the front desk of a hotel, and you don���t know whether the documents will be infected with a virus, whether the documents will remain ephemeral as there is this aspect of security component.

���So what we are trying to do is create a market place. Anyone who has a printer should be able to connect to CloudPrint network. And anyone who wants to print should have the ability to print to that printer if the permission is granted and the economic transaction should be between the person who wants to print and the person who owns a printer,��� added Solur.

The CloudPrint technology was launched on May 6 and right now HP is doing limited pilots with large corporations around the world.


(This correspondent was in Singapore at the invitation of Hewlett-Packard )