It is hard to find a home or office without an HP printer - after all, it is the largest printer manufacturer in the world.
On the other hand, it's hard to find a person who doesn't get frustrated with these printers every time they run out of ink and discover the exorbitant prices of new ink heads - one of the things that has made HP a powerhouse is the fact that it sells new printers at a price that is often cheaper than buying new ink heads, so people buy More and more printers.
On the other hand, over the years, a huge market has developed for cheap replacement ink heads, which HP is fiercely fighting.
Last week, in an interview with the CNBC network during the World Economic Forum held in Davos, HP CEO Enrique Lores claimed that the reason why the company is blocking printers whose owners have installed replacement ink heads is - hold on tight - cyber. We asked Claude to understand what the connection is.
According to Lores, the fear of cyber-attacks is what forces the company to make "dynamic security" updates to the printers, which disables them if they use ink from third-party companies.
He claims that hackable cartridge chips can transmit viruses and breach corporate networks.
But experts strongly dispute Lores's claim, calling his claim "plainly implausible," even in theory.
HP has admitted that it has never received a report of a real case of a cyber attack carried out using an ink head chip.
Critics claim that this is nothing more than an excuse aimed at protecting intellectual property and revenue, not customers.
Through controversial updates, HP managed to 'destroy' printers that could once be installed with cheap ink heads, so that they now only work with original HP heads - all, according to critics, with the aim of forcing customers to pay it more and more money.
But the CEO claims that this is not about exploiting corporate power, but about preventing "bad investments" from unprofitable users. Ours is a bad investment," he said.
In other words: the company sells the printers at aggressive prices, in order to profit later from follow-up purchases.
However, it doesn't matter whether the excuse is cyber risks, an attempt to ensure quality printing or a revenue model - the basic fact is that HP denies customers the right to choose, and leads a trend for manufacturers of printers and other devices, which legitimizes the transformation of the buyer from a person with the right to choose into a subject who is obliged and on to the company from which he chose to purchase.
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