Zebra Technologies Introduces Next Generation QLn Mobile Printer
Zebra Technologies announced the release of its QLn mobile printer family. According to research released by VDC in 2011, the global mobile worker population exceeded one billion in 2010 and with an increasingly mobile and distributed workforce, is expected to grow by over 10 percent over the next three years.
Zebra addresses this growing workforce with the QLn, the third generation of the QL printer, Zebra’s all-time best selling direct thermal mobile line.
The QLn builds off of the success of over 700,000 QL printers shipped to date by squarely addressing the primary request made by Zebra’s customers: lower the cost of operation. The QLn does this by including the industry’s first Ethernet connection for mobile printers. By enabling remote status collection and better device management, the printer helps reduce service time and maximizes printer uptime, delivering a greater return-on-investment.
“Demand for mobile printers continues to scale,” says Tom Wimmer, director of the AutoID and transaction processing practice at VDC.
“At the same time, total cost of ownership has become a leading purchase consideration for enterprises evaluating mobile devices. Knowledgeable users are increasingly focused on reducing productivity losses associated with hardware failure, and managing spiraling IT support costs. Leading mobile device suppliers like Zebra understand these requirements and are responding with smarter products designed to address them.”
The QLn is also the first printer with Zebra’s Power Smart Print Technology. This feature delivers faster processing and throughput with lower power drain, giving mobile workers better quality printing and more uptime on the job. Zebra’s smart battery technology on the QLn displays charge and overall battery health, which minimizes downtime due to older, poor-performing batteries that don’t last entire shifts.
“Businesses, particularly in the retail and healthcare sectors, are facing greater challenges in building customer satisfaction and increase their process efficiencies while reducing operational costs,” said Andrew Tay, president of Zebra Technologies Asia Pacific.
“In the retail sector, businesses need reliable printing of labels and tag to enable efficient transfers, returns and price and inventory checks; while accurate bed side specimen labeling is crucial to patient care in the healthcare sector. The QLn responds directly to these business needs and customer pain points with innovative and expanded features without compromising on the QL printer line’s durability.”
The QLn also improves on the previous QL models by offering:
* Easier Integration: Backwards compatibility with the QL and QL Plus printers lets users upgrade to the QLn without changing media or label formats, network and other infrastructure.
* Global reach: Zebra’s UnicodeTM UTF-16-compliant Global Printing Solution offers right-to-left printing capabilities, giving companies around the world the option to print in many languages.
* Improved user interface: Larger, easier to read display with five-way navigation, help menus and alerts gives users greater control, enables faster operation.
