Cup and bowl color printer

According to the statistics of the printing machinery branch of China Printing and Equipment Industry Association, in the first half of the year, the total output value of the printing machinery industry reached 249.52 million yuan, down 26.4% from the same period last year; the sales revenue of the products reached 2605.65 million yuan, down 18.4% from the same period last year; the total profit reached 125.42 million yuan, down 28.7% from the same period last year; and the export delivery value reached 3.16 million yuan, down from the same period last year. The decline was 36.2%.

"The economic indicators of the whole industry have declined more seriously than in the same period, indicating that the adverse impact of the international financial crisis on the printing machinery industry has not been weakened, and the printing industry has also been affected by changes in the printing industry, especially the emergence of the Internet and mobile phones, which are quietly changing people's reading habits, leading to a decline in the demand for traditional printing products." Zhang Zhiyuan, an expert from the Printing Machinery Branch of China Printing and Equipment Industry Association, recently analyzed the trend of the industry. At the same time, he suggested that printing machine manufacturers should take advantage of the financial crisis to speed up product restructuring, develop some high-end printing machinery products, and improve market competitiveness.

Traditional Demand Decline Digital Printing Rise

According to the survey of China Newspaper Association, the total print volume of newspapers in 2008 was 159.4 billion, which was 2.45% lower than 163.4 billion in 2007, and the annual consumption of newsprint was 3.58 million tons, which was 2.45% lower than that of 3.67 million tons in 2007. From 1999 to 2006 published by the General Administration of Press and Publication, the backlog of books in China is increasing.

The reduction of demand for traditional printing products is not only in China's printing market. According to statistics, from the fourth quarter of 2006 to the third quarter of 2007, the overall decline of the printing industry in the United States was 10%. Russia lost 2% of its traditional printing readers every year. In the past five years, the number of traditional printing enterprises in Britain has decreased by an average of 4%.

While the traditional printing industry is shrinking, digital printing has developed rapidly.

According to the statistics of relevant British institutions, the digital printing industry in the country has already occupied 9% of the printing market, and it is expected that this number will rise to 20%-25% by 2011. This trend of digital printing has been proved by the change of relative market share of various printing processes in North America. According to statistics, in 1990, the market share of traditional printing in North America reached 91%, while that of digital printing was zero, and that of other additional services was 9%. By 2005, the market share of traditional printing dropped to 66%, while that of digital printing rose to 13%, and that of other additional services was 21%. A global forecast shows that the global digital printing market turnover will reach 120 million US dollars in 2011.

"The above data sets undoubtedly send a signal to enterprises: survival of the fittest. Printing machine manufacturers will be eliminated from the market if they fail to adjust their product mix. Zhang Zhiyuan said, "From the 7th International Printing Exhibition held in Beijing in May this year, we have clearly seen the current changes in the printing market and the development trend of printing technology."

For example, as a way of digital printing, inkjet printing can completely get rid of the steps of pre-printing, transfer printing and so on. It can use more kinds of ink, through the inkjet head, it can easily realize direct printing on the printing materials of various materials. The emergence of inkjet printing products has accelerated the pace of market-oriented printing enterprises and created new business opportunities for all printing enterprises.

In 2008, China's import of printing machinery products also confirmed this new trend. In 2008, China imported 162 million US dollars of digital and inkjet printers, accounting for 9.37% of the total imports, an increase of 0.96% over the previous year. In particular, the imports of digital inkjet printers reached US$133 million in 2008, accounting for 7.69% of the total imports, an increase of 1.48% over the previous year.

Traditional offset printing is awaiting new vitality

Zhang Zhiyuan pointed out that although the emergence of new media largely met the individual needs of consumers and brought great impact to traditional printing, resulting in shrinking demand for sheet and web offset presses and flexographic presses, traditional printing is still irreplaceable in the future development, and traditional printing machinery will continue to dominate the market.

Even so, he believes that the traditional printing machine manufacturers must take the initiative to change and develop towards the high-end to maximize production efficiency, diversify value-added services, and differentiate printing space, so as to expand the living space.