The Growing World Of Inkjet
Part 3 of 3
If inkjet can be considered a bandwagon technology, graphic communications professionals are jumping on It - and at an impressive rate.
by Julian Robledo, General Manager, Agfa
Corporation, Inkjet Division
(reprinted with permision by IPA)
Research & Development Just over two years ago inkjet had a very small share of the global print market. At Agfa, our entrance into the category could not have been better timed. We already had more than a century of imaging experience and were eagerly looking for new technological horizons to reach and challenges to solve. Additionally, the marketplace in general was starting to become very vocal in its need to achieve a better return on equipment investments. So we began exploring the possibilities of inkjet and quickly discovered that we were able to tap into major breakthroughs almost from the beginning of our pursuit.
Over the last two years we have come out with many inkjet solutions. Our investment in inkjet R&D has been well served. Working independently and with other major companies, we have been successful in developing or co-developing effective new systems, ink heads and inks.
Future Watch
Today, the North American and western and central European markets are the
biggest users of inkjet, with eastern Europe and Asia not far behind and
catching up quickly. The category is expected to make big leaps in Asia, led by
the fast-growing Chinese market because of the graphically-strong nature of the
Chinese printed language.
There is also much hope for the increased market share of inkjet in Latin America, although less stringent environmental issues may keep conventional printing fairly strong for quite a while.
The history of most technologies shows how products almost always get faster and cheaper in time. Inkjet is no exception, as the results of our own R&D have shown. That's a good sign for the print industry of the future, because the market is expected to become even more competitive than it is today. Faster and cheaper will be welcomed by most shops and in-plant print departments, which will continue to be dependent on speed. Clients will want their jobs turned around quickly in order to maximize the effectiveness of whatever advertising and promotion those projects are designed to support.
Also, they will need a return on long- and short-term capital expenditures in order to have enough capital for other important things, such as expansion, employee development and their own advertising and promotion.
Inkjet is the high-quality print technology that can help them achieve both the speed and the return on investment they seek.
There may even be more uses for inkjet in the future, opening up new worlds of marketing in which many printers may participate. Decorative printing, security printer, POP, short run "just-in-time" printing are among the coming newer uses. We are starting to hear about applications, such as 3D, specialty products and more. As has been true with most technologies over the decades, entirely new applications, components and methodologies will make their way down the R&D pipelines and into the marketplace over the next few years. However, the inkjet success story is clearly being written right now, and it is a story that we are certain will be with us for a long time to come.
Author: Julian Robledo, General Manager, Agfa Corp., Inkjet Div.
publisher's note: As we've said many times before, when you
team up with the best that's out there, you raise your own standards manifold.
In the words of Emerald, the famous TV Chef …. Raise It Up A Notch! For
that reason, we chose this article for you (that we split into 3 portions) from
the "IPA Bulletin".
(for the full article in hard copy, contact the publisher:
omike@dealercommunicator.com)
See Part 1 in February's issue
IPA, The Association of Graphic Solution Providers, is a community of premedia professionals within the creative, corporate, print publishing, packaging and in-plant sectors within the graphic communication industry. IPA is a forum for peer networking and a vital source of business, technical, and management resources for graphic solutions providers. It's where the industry's leading technical managers turn for information on how to strengthen their graphics workflow competencies and where business leaders turn for tools that will help them grow their business. DC