In this episode, I was joined by Dave Crist who is the President of Brother Mobile Solutions. We discussed their new TD-4 Desktop Thermal Printers, ease of connectivity, and their hardware as a service program.

Key Takeaways

• Brother is well known for multiple different product lines which include sewing machines and their P-Touch line of label printers. Brother Mobile Solutions focuses on printers for logistics solutions and other mobile applications such as in police cars or trucks. They started this line with a full-page printer called the PocketJet which is a thermal transfer printer and totally mobile.
• Recently, Brother Mobile Solutions released a new line of desktop thermal transfer printers called the TD-4 series. Dave discusses how this line was developed by taking some learnings from the mobile side on connectivity. Typical these types of printers are limited in how they can be connected but Brother was able to have these printers be connected in multiple different ways. The expansion of connectivity allows for the printers to now be connected wirelessly via wireless networks or even Bluetooth. This is a huge deal because it gives your operation a ton of flexibility on where printers can be set up and how you can move them around. It also gives you the ability to bring more printers online a lot quicker when you have a surge in demand or work.
• We have talked about robots as a service on the show and also are familiar with software as a service but Brother Mobile Solutions has an offering called Shift & Print which is a hardware as a service program. This is very important because it takes what would typically be a capital expenditure and turns it into an operational expenditure. With lower investment, it allows you to have newer technology without putting in a huge commitment financially. The subscription service can be tailored to your specific needs and helps to make sure you are covered during peak season with more hardware as needed. I believe this is the future of most things as it allows companies to keep up from a technology standpoint and financially it is more beneficial for a company.