This Month's Spectrum Summary:

(The following is an excerpt from the October 2006 issue of Spectrum, a proprietary monthly briefing published exclusively for the clients of I.T. Strategies, Inc. © 2006)

LABELEXPO REPORT Digital Vendors, Applications Multiply; Digital/Flexo Breakeven Gap Narrows

This month our analyst Liz Ziepniewski shares with us her review of last month's Labelexpo in Chicago. So far digital label printing remains a small portion of the total label market, but it is growing in significance, and will continue to do so in the near future with the introduction of new products and further advances in the technology. The market is significant for the industry as a whole since label applications force suppliers to meet some of the industry's most demanding requirements. Among these are stringent color quality for primary labels, diverse substrates, and tough image survivability challenges, as in auto industry labels. Among the notable introductions at the show:

Both Sun and Jetrion introduced new printers based on the iTi DWP (Digital Web Press) platform. The ink link places these vendors in a good position in the labels world. Jetrion, formerly a wholly owned subsidiary of Flint Ink, is an established label industry vendor. Sun Chemical is a major label ink supplier for analog presses. The Sun Solaris is a color inkjet press with a top speed of 150 feet/minute and 80 feet/minute with full-color, and is said to be three times the speed of Indigo and Xeikon, but may never achieve their quality attributes. Jetrion introduced its one-pass, full-color Jetrion 4000, which can be configured standalone or mounted on a flexo press. Also announced was that Aquaflex will be marketing its flexo presses mounted with a Jetrion monochrome module.

An analog technology innovation at Labelexpo that impacts digital is the increased focus on servo-driven presses for quicker job changes. Makeready time from job to job is a major productivity factor working in favor of digital. So this innovation will tilt breakeven back toward analog a bit.

Other introductions included:

Degrava Systems with a desktop color laser label printer. Based on an Oki Data engine, the new roll-to-roll (R2R) printer looks like an important price/performance breakthrough.

Digital Print, Inc., a small but established VAR in Texas, showed Spectra heads with UV inks and introduced two new thermal inkjet modules for label printing applications.

PAT Technology Systems, Inc. demonstrated its new digital embossing and coding system for labels.

DataLase Ltd. demonstrated an innovative labeling technology. Package materials are pre-printed with the company's proprietary PacMark ink which is heat-sensitive so it can be printed by computer-controlled laser. Konica Minolta showed its fixed-array head printing in monochrome.

Mimaki showed wide format roll-to-roll printers targeting label applications.

Established digital label press vendors Indigo and Xeikon both introduced new features, among them software to calculate breakeven more accurately, improved inks and priming materials, upgraded press features, and white ink capability.

For Liz, the major impression at Labelexpo is that digital is no longer just a niche technology. With new vendors, improved speed, and lower consumable costs offering ever higher digital/flexo breakevens, and breakthroughs in price/performance, it seems clear that label printing is one of the first industrial applications where digital has become widely accepted.