By Petr Kramerius and Boris Kuschev, Regional Managers at Infosource.
Printer sales through official channels in Russia—the largest printer market in the Eurasian Economic Union (EEU)—shrank in 2023 and the first quarter of 2024 as sanctions continued to bite. The toner-based MFP market decreased by 25% to around 508,000 units in 2023 and declined 19% year-over-year in the first quarter of 2024.
In 2021 before the war in Ukraine, the market was close to 1 million units. It is important to add the caveat that Russia has a thriving gray market for printers that cannot be easily monitored when discussing sales and revenue. Parallel imports of certain Western brands continues, even though they have officially left the market.
The personal MFP category saw a decline of 22% in 2023 and 21% in the first quarter of 2024. The personal color market decreased 14% to only 20,000 units. The Chinese brand, Pantum, retained the leading position in the personal MFP market with an 87.4% share, followed by Russia‘s Katusha (7.9% share), which moved from eight to second place, and China‘s Huawei in third place. By 2023, HP, Canon, Xerox and Lexmark had left the market.
Office sales were down 59% in 2023 and 21% in the first quarter of 2024, representing a 4% share of the MFP market. Black and white (BW) sales decreased 72%, while the color office sales fell 6%. The South Korean brand, Sindoh, moved from seventh place to number one with a 63.4% market share, followed by Katusha, which improved from sixth position to second (29% share).
The toner-based single-function page printer market (proportionally 60% of the total toner-based MFP market) registered a decrease of 29% in 2023 and 22% in the first quarter of 2024. The BW SFP market decreased by 29% and represented a 96% share of total SFP sales. The color SFP category declined by 25%. Pantum dominated with 90% market share.
The official Russian inkjet market contracted from 184,000 units to around 8,000. This market has all but disappeared because the Russian and Chinese MFP and SFP brands that have replaced exiting Western brands are toner and laser-based. It remains possible to buy some inkjet devices through parallel imports.
Large-format printer sales in Russia were down 37% in 2023. The solvent segment increased 59% and replaced water-based inks as the main category.
The document scanner market decreased by 36% in 2023 and 29% in the first quarter of 2024. The consumer scanner segment declined by 10% in 2023 and by 24% in the first quarter of 2024. Avision was the top scanner brand with a 71.8% share, while Plustek led the consumer category with 55.3% share. Both Avision and Plustek are Taiwanese brands.
