March 22, 2007
A new arrow in HP’s photo-printing quiver
Tabblo, the latest addition to Hewlett-Packard’s photo printing portfolio, is an interesting case study of how computer and printer maker is trying to branch out from its inkjet and laserjet roots in search of new growth.
Tabblo, based in Cambridge, Massachusetts, is a nifty little web site that lets users take photos from their computers or from any number of other photo sites like Flickr, and turn them into products like posters, coffee mugs, and the like.
The site relies on Ajax to make it easy for its 150,000 or so users to drag and drop photos in text into a variety of customizable layouts. As it happens, HP has been investing heavily in printers that can churn out high-quality prints of photos, posters, calendars and even hard-bound books.
It’s all part of an effort to capture more of the trillions of pages printed around the world each year. The more pages HP captures, the more high-margin ink, equipment and services HP sells. Considering that Tabbo’s acquisition price is unlikely to amount to any more than a rounding error on its P&L statement, it looks to be a savvy move.
Enjoyed the post. Just wanted to add to it.
One of the things that excites us most about our acquisition of Tabblo is that the technology extends well beyond photo printing to all types of web content. For examply, a mom who keeps a blog of her new-born baby could print that blog content to create a baby book of sorts - all it requires is the right enabling print technology. There are business applications too. Imagine you are planning a trip on a travel site. By incorporating the hp-Tabblo technology into its web site, the travel site could allow a visitor to print out tickets, maps, restaurant reviews, hotel information, itinerary etc into a properly formatted travel packet.
hp plans to work with major web destinations to embed the newly acquired technology into their sites. We see this being applied in all print relevant sites across the web - and going way beyond photos.
Posted by: Pradeep Jotwani | March 22nd, 2007 at 11:51 pm | Report this commentWelcome, Pradeep! It’s great to hear HP chime in on the Tech Blog.
You raise some interesting possiblities. How do you foresee businesses incorporating Tabblo into their web sites - would it be done just through the open APIs or would HP take an active role in helping to set it up?
Posted by: Kevin Allison | March 23rd, 2007 at 2:47 pm | Report this commentKevin, regarding your question on how hp foresees incorporating Tabblo print functionality into web sites. Our ultimate goal is make it very easy for web site owners to incorporate print capabilities. We will do this in a number of ways, including reaching out to, and working with major web site owners.
Posted by: Pradeep Jotwani | March 24th, 2007 at 12:15 am | Report this comment