In pursuit of sustainable development and cleaner production, Xerox used in its Model 914 the relatively new environment-friendly electrophotography process, which is a dry process that avoids the use of wet chemicals.

While the technology was superior to earlier copy methods, the cost of the machine was six to seven times more expensive than alternative technologies.

The model of selling the equipment below cost and making up the difference by large margins in the sale of supplies was not viable because the cost of the supplies was about the same as that of the alternatives, so there was little room to maneuver.

Xerox then decided to market the new product itself and developed a new business model to do so.

The new model leased the equipment to the customer at a relatively low cost and then charged a per copy fee for copies in excess of 2000 copies per month. At that time, the average business copier produced an average of only 15-20 copies per day.

For this model to be profitable to Xerox, the use of copies would have to increase substantially.

Fortunately for Xerox, the quality and the convenience of the new copy technology proved itself and companies began to make thousands of copies per day.