HP Imaging and Printing Group (IPG) commercial sales director Dave Poskett said over the past year HP had come to realise Williams Lea's skill set in the print management arena.

"We feel HP has some great products and are keen to build a more structured relationship," said Williams Lea chief executive Tim Griffiths.

This has been developing over the past nine months, and Griffiths said Williams Lea was likely to do a lot of business with HP over the next two years as its business expands in Europe and Asia.

"We have been talking to their sales people about customers of mutual interest, Poskett said.

Although he declined to reveal any customers, he said HP had been talking to Williams Lea about products including the HP LaserJet 9055 mfp and LaserJet 9065 mfp, mono multi-functional printers, for high-volume office printing.

Another product is HP's Digital Pen 200, which acts like a normal pen but recreates forms digitally, and transmits data via USB to a host PC.

The pen contains ink and a small camera that records the pens strokes and saves them to its memory.

Last month Williams Lea acquired document capture and management business Formation e-Document Solutions (PrintWeek, 22 July).

Griffiths was keen to point out that the deal with HP does not mean Williams Lea is abandoning longstanding supplier Xerox.

"They remain critical supply partners to our business," he said.

Story by Andy Scott