At present, most wireless, or ever wired, printers require a patch or a software installation on your device to enable printing, which can be frustrating.
The Mopria Allicance is aiming to change this.
The way we print is changing. With the advent of wireless printing and the increasing prominence of BYOD in the workplace thanks to smartphones and tablets, printing needs to become universally compatible.
Canon, HP, Samsung and Xerox have teamed together in an effort to make wireless mobile printing consistently easy for users. The Alliance developed the Mopria mark so users will only need to look for the designation to know their devices are mobile print ready.
BY the end of 2013, the number of mobile-connected devices will exceed the number of people on earth. 40% of employees currently use their smartphones on the job, this is expected to increase to 56% in the next three years. Yet while mobile devices have become ubiquitous, printing has not.
50% of mobile device users do not know how to use mobile print services and most mobile printing solutions lack compatibility with other printers and devices.
Mopria area promoting their standard for universal printing by embedded print functionality into mobile devices, so no set-up is required. This will enable network, peer-to-peer and local wireless printing.
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At a demonstration I attended, a photo was taken of me and moments later a printed photo was placed in front of me. They are pioneering new touch-point printing where one simply touches their device onto a pad on the printer and Near Field Communication allows instant printing. It’s nearly fool proof…
As well as pictures, the Mopria standard will support PDF and Word documents. Manufacturers will promote their own products as Mopria certified as more products are made compatible to embrace the universal mobile print philosophy.
The Alliance is also encouraging more companies to join them in a bid to unify print solutions. They are reaching out to phone, tablet and printer manufacturers, app developers, OS providers and mobile service carriers.
