A Black-and-white Issue

"It's not going to be a short-term thing," says Smith. "I believe it will take eight to 10 years before the analog copier is really dead."

The future, though, does belong to digital, he adds.

"If you are a manufacturer and you don't have a full digital line, you are dead out there. Manufacturers are not going to go away from that," Smith says. It's not so much consumer demand driving this evolution, rather it's a sort of 'keeping up with the Joneses' manufacturing mentality.