Colour digital presses for packaging estimated to mark 10.3 percent growth

Converters worldwide spent $166 million on production level colour digital presses used to print labels and packaging in 2010, and that total will grow at a 10.3 percent annual rate, 2010 to 2015, estimates InfoTrends in his new report, ‘Colour Digital Packaging and Labels Market Forecast: 2010-2015’, which includes a detailed numerical description the regional markets for costly colour digital presses made by such companies as Agfa, EFI Jetrion, HP Indigo, Xeikon, and Xerox, cut by electrophotographic and inkjet technologies.

InfoTrends’ forecast report describes the placements, revenues, and installed bases for the collective brands for the forecast period worldwide. The forecast also estimates revenues for media, toners, and inks cut by label, folding carton, and flexible packaging applications, and it calculates value of printed output for each.

“The year 2010 was a bigger year for colour electrophotographic presses than we expected, meanwhile inkjet placements were not as robust as we had earlier forecasted,” said Bob Leahey, the forecast’s author and associate director of InfoTrends’ colour digital label and package continuous information service, “There’s good growth, though, on both sides. Converters now often use colour digital presses in tandem with their analog systems, and some converters operate both electrophotographic and inkjet presses.”

“Right now label and packaging converters worldwide bill about $2 billion annually for the output of their colour digital presses,” Leahey continued. “While about 95 percent of that value is for labels for consumer goods, the young folding carton and flexible packaging applications are themselves growing. Geographically, Europe/Middle East/Africa (EMEA) and North America (NA) and are the biggest markets for colour digital label and packaging presses. Asia Pacific and Japan (AP/J) and rest of world (ROW) are the smaller and faster-growing regions.”