Following Xerox’s acquisition of Lexmark, and with Go Inspire continuing to grow inside the Xerox business, Danny Molhoek and Danny Cook explain how the combined organisation is bringing hardware, data, AI and customer experience closer together for retailers.
For Xerox, the past year has been one of significant change. The company’s acquisition of Lexmark has created a much broader organisation, combining Lexmark’s strength in managed print services and retail environments with Xerox’s wider portfolio, digital services and AI capability.
At the same time, Go Inspire, the data-driven marketing services and communications business acquired by Xerox in 2022, has continued to expand its role within the group.
Danny Cook, who was recently announced as group managing director of Go Inspire, believes that much opportunity lies in connecting data, customer insight and execution across channels. Retail Gazette sat down with Cook and Danny Molhoek, president enterprise sales, Western Europe at Xerox, at the recent Retail Technology Show to discuss the biggest developments internally, and where retailers can find a competitive edge this year.
Molhoek noted that the Lexmark acquisition is first and foremost about breadth. “From a portfolio point of view, Lexmark had great products in the retail space,” he says. “With Xerox, that now expands into a much larger range of products, all the way up to production units. From the smallest device to the largest, we can bring that whole portfolio to market.”
According to Molhoek, the overlap between the two organisations is smaller than many might assume. Lexmark has historically been strong in retail, particularly in stores and distribution centres, while Xerox brings scale, global reach and additional production and services capability.
“We’ve already seen the first deals where Lexmark’s strength in managed print services for retail stores and distribution centres is being combined with Xerox production print room offerings,” he explains. “We can take that to market as one offering.”
Cook sees the same logic from the Go Inspire side of the business. While Xerox continues to diversify its revenue streams, Go Inspire adds capability around data analysis, marketing communications, customer loyalty and retention.
“We’re very strong in analysing data, looking at patterns and executing communications across any channel,” he says. “The value is in closing that loop, making sure the lifecycle around loyalty, retention and upsell is measured against the metrics that actually matter.”
For retailers, that combined offer is a huge advantage. The industry has spent years talking about seamless customer experiences, omnichannel journeys and data-driven decision-making. Yet many businesses still struggle with fragmented systems, disconnected departments and uncertainty over where to start.
Cook believes this is where Go Inspire can act as a bridge.
“We bring together strategy, data, creative and channel in one seamless place,” he says. “A lot of businesses are fragmented, so being that glue between different parts of the organisation is where we can add value.”
Molhoek agrees, adding that Xerox’s role is increasingly to act as a single point of access for customers, even when the answer involves multiple partners or specialist services. “The value we try to bring is being the one portal the customer can talk to,” he says.
One of the biggest challenges retailers face is not a lack of ambition, but paralysis. Many know where they want to get to, but struggle to move forward because of legacy technology, internal silos, cost concerns or fear of making the wrong decision.
Molhoek says this is a familiar pattern.
“People are concerned about whether the direction is still the right direction,” he says. “They keep asking that question, and sometimes it slows everything down. Often these projects start with a baseline: what have you already done, what do you have, and what additional layers can we build on top?”
Cook argues that the best way through that paralysis is to start with the outcome, not the technology.
“What is the desired outcome?” he asks. “Is it driving footfall, improving retention, building loyalty? You work back from that and build the journey. If you focus only on the output or the thing you are delivering, you miss the bigger point.”
That approach is particularly important in conversations around AI. Retailers are under pressure to explore AI, but many are still cautious about where to invest and how quickly to move. Both Molhoek and Cook believe the most successful retailers will be those that apply AI practically, rather than chasing the concept in abstract.
For Molhoek, AI’s power lies in lots of small, useful improvements that accumulate over time. “It is like change by a thousand paper cuts,” he says. “There are lots of little changes that help. AI can save time, help people make decisions quicker and automate things that used to be manual.”
One example is in grocery, where AI can be used to identify products approaching the end of shelf life and trigger pricing changes automatically.
“You can see, through cameras or phones, that strawberries on a rack are starting to go off,” Molhoek explains. “AI can help make a decision almost automatically, changing the price so they become a sale item. That can help revenue and reduce waste.”
Cook points to AI’s ability to identify customer segments that might otherwise be missed.
“In one example, the assumption was that a particular customer segment was the right one to target,” he says. “But when the purchasing data and personas were analysed, there was another segment, a very close second, that the business had not been targeting at all. That was a real ‘aha’ moment.”
However, both are clear that retailers cannot afford to wait for perfect data before acting.
“If you wait for perfection, you never get there,” says Cook. “Something that is 80 per cent there, with 20 per cent refining, is better than doing nothing. That is how you get out of paralysis. You start, test, learn and adapt.”
Molhoek takes a similar view. “How many dashboards do you need in order to make a decision?” he asks. “I need five. I don’t need 375. If the data is 80 or 90 per cent accurate, it already gives you a direction.”
However, Cook warns that, as AI becomes more embedded, brands must not become so focused on efficiency that they forget the customer.
“My concern is that some brands will go too far into making cost efficiencies with AI and forget about customer experience,” he says. “If AI saves money in one area, and that money is used to improve the customer experience, that is where brands will succeed.”
Molhoek also sees major potential for AI to improve the in-store journey, provided it is used responsibly.
“As a consumer, I don’t want to spend hours in a store trying to find what I need,” he says. “Imagine what AI could do to help people make the right choice quickly. But it has to be done in the right way. Data privacy is incredibly important, and there has to be a clear line.”
Looking ahead, neither expects retailers to suddenly embark on a wave of dramatic AI spending. Instead, they expect a more measured period of exploration, investment and practical deployment.
“Retailers will keep thinking about which direction they want to go in and where they want to invest,” says Molhoek. “I don’t think that is going to change overnight.”
“Retail is such a competitive space,” Cook adds. “The brands that rise to the top will be those who use data and AI to shift, change and adapt quickly, but without losing sight of the customer.”
For Xerox, Lexmark and Go Inspire, the opportunity is to help retailers make that shift. Connecting physical and digital channels, turning data into action, and ensuring AI is applied in ways that improve both efficiency and experience.
As Cook puts it, the principle remains simple: “No matter how much AI you have, the customer should not be forgotten.”
Click here to sign up to Retail Gazette‘s free daily email newsletter
