Enterprise

Google prints securely and sustainably on zero trust infrastructure with PaperCut

Cutting to the chase

Problem

Evolving campus outgrew library pay-for-print model

Solution

New fleet with a campus-wide rollout of PaperCut MF

Outcome

Visibility, waste reduction, and ease of use for entire campus

Founded in 1893, American University is a private research college located in Washington, D.C. Their alumni include multiple Pulitzer Prize and Nobel Prize winners.

Home to more than 14,000 students and 4,500 staff members across 50 buildings, American University required a campus-wide print management solution. They coupled this with refreshing their entire device fleet.

Part of a top-down initiative, the university’s IT team Brian Blair and Tony Loffredo needed a solution that would boost their infrastructure’s efficiency, while achieving their sustainability goals, and shrinking costs.

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Overall, it is one of the nicer pieces of software to administrate."

- Tony Loffredo,

Assistant Director, Academic Technology

Problem

Google Cloud Print deprecation leads to a print solution gap

After deprecating Google Cloud Print, the global technology giant was in the market for a new print solution.

“We had basically two options on the table at the time,” says Ofer Bar-Zakai, Engineering and Operations Manager at Google. “One was to take over the infrastructure for what used to be Google Cloud Print as a public product and make it internalized only. And then we’d have to maintain whatever that infrastructure meant."

The other option was a wildcard: either build or buy an alternative. Any printing solution needed to support Google’s zero trust infrastructure, BeyondCorp. “Google does not rely on direct connections to our own internal infrastructure and we don’t use VPNs,” says Ofer. “So all the printing capabilities need to comply with that BeyondCorp infrastructure.”

Solution

Zero trust compliance and native OS support with PaperCut

“We needed a product that supported our needs, specifically security and infrastructure,” says Ofer.

“Everything had to support BeyondCorp, including printing from the OS itself. We had to support, at the very least, the three major platforms that we have at Google, which is basically Linux, Mac, and Windows.”

“We wanted, if possible, support from mobile devices as well. We wanted the ability to badge in order to collect your prints. But we also wanted the ability for either direct printing or badge pick-up.“

“When we did proof of concept with PaperCut MF, it literally took a matter of days,” says Ofer. “The solution was up and running on a testing GCP domain that we have with whatever instances we needed. It was easy. It was smooth.”

Outcome

Infrastructure ease-of-use and security/sustainability “win-win”

“There are two key elements that PaperCut brought to the table,” says Ofer. The first outcome was the native OS compatibility with Google’s BeyondCorp solution. The second was the ability for a user to press print in Google’s New York office and collect that same print job in their London office after travel.

PaperCut also met Google’s environmental and data sovereignty requirements. “Sustainability is very important to Google nowadays,” says Ofer. “So the idea that we could literally save paper on printing was appealing to us from the get-go.”

“Funnily enough, it’s not only sustainability,” says Ofer. “If you’re as focused on security as we are, then I think you’ll get what you need from the PaperCut solution.”

“It was kind of a win-win for everyone,” says Ofer. “Everyone likes it. I think it was a great match.”