A multifunction Lexmark device is used for scoring at the PGA Championship.
Lexington, KY – At golf’s major championships the laser focus of competitors is what often garners the spotlight. But at this past weekend’s PGA Championship at Louisville’s Valhalla Golf Club, Lexington-based Lexmark International made its laser products and software the focus for major clients from around the world.
Just as the company has done at a handful of other PGA Championships, Senior Championships and a Ryder Cup, Lexmark capitalized on its partnership with the Professional Golfers’ Association of America to show its customers and prospective customers what its technology can do for them.
Much of the conference space at Lexington’s Griffin Gate Marriott Resort and Spa was taken over last week by the company that got its start as a printer manufacturer after spinning off from IBM and has been transition to a solutions outfit since starting a bevy of software company acquisitions in 2010.
Before taking a chartered bus to a private chalet overlooking Valhalla’s picturesque island green on the 13th hole, Lexmark customers heard from company executives about the type of information and possibilities now available through Lexmark’s software and hardware. A similar pitch proved successful to the PGA as the association employs Lexmark systems throughout the tournaments it manages.
As now four-time major champion Rory McIlroy finished his triumphant 3 under par, 68-shot fourth round to finish 16 under for the tournament – one shot under legendary lefty Phil Mickelson – McIlroy, or his caddy, ran his scorecard through a Lexmark device thereby making his round official and entering the handwritten data into systems used around the tournament.
Lexmark uses the partnership that’s been in place with the PGA since 2008 in use at PGA offices and tournaments as an incentive to spend quality time with customers it not only looks to gain but retain and grow with a mix of high production value hotel conference room presentations and demonstrations as well as face time through receptions and causal gatherings at the main attraction, the golf tournament.
This year’s presentations to decision makers from major companies took on a TED Talk style according to Lexmark’s Vice President and General Manager of North America Imaging Solutions and Services, Ron Binkauskas.
Binkauskas and his colleagues presented about the need for information, what a person, or in this case, a company doesn’t know, can kill them. President William McKinley was being treated for what turned out to be a fatal gunshot wound in 1901 just feet from the world’s first x-ray machine on display at the Buffalo Pan-American Exposition. The long-since common device was never put to use as doctors fished for the fatal bullet, one Lexmark executive told the crowd.
Dale Earnhardt, Jr. finished less than one second ahead of Casey Mears at this year’s Daytona 500, but Mears wasn’t second, Mears was 10th. The cars are fast, Lexmark’s Perceptive Software division VP of Global Retail Software Solutions Dean A. Sleeper told the crowd, the drivers are good, the difference is in the decisions being made with the information available.
“We love the technology, we think they’re a leader in the technology space and we’ve gone out and looked at others,” Lexmark customer Blake Pease a VP at insurance giant UNUM said about his company’s relationship with Lexmark. The suite of hardware and software installed at UNUM’s company’s four campuses and dozens of other offices in the US and Europe kicks back information to Pease and his staff to tell them what’s being printed, if the hardware in that location is what needs to be there for the tasks its doing, what could be done elsewhere, what’s needed, what’s being abused and more.
Pease said he had just installed Lexmark’s secure print technology, or as his company calls it, swipe and print, in reference to the swiping of an identification to print documents that have already been queued by the user.
Pease said the time he spent in from Maine last week afforded him much more than seeing one of the more exciting major golf tournaments in recent history. It gave him time to talk directly with his customer service liaisons and division heads like Binkauskas to discuss his company’s needs that can either be handled by current Lexmark systems he might be unaware of, or could be taken into account when new systems are developed.
In all Lexmark anticipating hosting around 300 participants representing some 240 large account customers.