ABSTRACT
The Xerox Corporation of the USA developed the commercial uses of the electrostatic copying process from a 1938 invention of Mr Chester Carlson, an American patent lawyer. It launched its first viable xerographic office copier in 1959. Protected by patents, the company grew phenomenally and completely dominated the world copier market through the 1960s and into the early 1970s. Xerox became a multi-product international company marketing a wide range of document processing equipment including copiers/duplicators, facsimile machines, laser printers, scanners, electronic publishing systems, workstations, networks and software. Currently it has sales of US$16.6bn (1 ECU = US$1.12 or UK£0.66) and profits of US$1.1bn.
