News Release

In northeast Japan, the area most seriously affected by the Great East Japan Earthquake and Tsunami, many people still live in temporary housing and face many kinds of difficulties. Ricoh thinks it is very important to provide not only quick support after the disaster but also sustained support to the victims.

One of Ricoh's efforts is "Community Caravan Printout Service." Ricoh's vehicles equipped with PCs and MFPs make regular rounds to distribute announcements from local governments and help residents print and make copies of essential documents such as disaster victim certificates to apply for various support. Ricoh began offering this service in one area from June and it is now being offered in three parts in the region.

Another initiative is "Save the Memory Project" which started in August. Collaborating with several NPOs and local governments, this project involves retrieving and cleaning photographs flooded and damaged by the tsunami. The photos are then scanned on an MFP and stored on "quanp", Ricoh's cloud service. Local governments provide space for people to search their photos which are often tender memories of loved ones. When they find the pictures they were looking for, the digitized image along with the original photos are returned to the owners. We are deeply gratified to hear effusive expressions of joy when people find their photos. It is an enormous task, more than 40,000 photos have been cleaned so far, and the process of returning originals to owners has begun. The "Save the Memory Project" has been highlighted by many media including nation-wide/local TV stations, newspapers, and business publications.

Not only are these projects consistent with Ricoh's philosophy of contributing to the society at the interface of people and information, but they have given us ideas for potential new business.

"Community Caravan Printout Service" is well received in the local communities.	Washing and treating flooded and damaged  photos manually one by one.	Tsunami victims are spending long time to find their pictures from thousands of photos in a temporary space provided by the local government.