What do you feel were the main trends and key industry developments in 2023?
Sustainability solidified its position and is here to stay. As organisations accelerate their sustainability initiatives, printers and converters are looking into how they operate to be more sustainable themselves and also offering more environmentally friendly products to their clients.
There is a responsibility for printers to be transparent in their communications, offering visibility to where materials are sourced, applied and how they are disposed of. From equipment used, to inks and substrates, consumers are more trusting of businesses that are committed to meeting circular economy standards.
The ongoing energy crisis saw printers proactively implementing solutions that allow them to save on energy costs (especially those in Europe), including switching from UV lamps to UV LED, installing solar panels, and realising energy savings by moving old conventional equipment to digital ones.
Goods supply is becoming less trustworthy: in the aftermath of the pandemic, the movement of global freight has faced increasing costs, and production has shifted from predominantly APAC markets to US and European markets. The main benefit for printers and converters being the reduction in traditionally very expensive shipping costs.
For 2024, we anticipate the continued global to local approach with faster turnaround times.
We are also seeing an ever-predominant balancing act between supply vs. demand, particularly in the labels and packaging market. In 2021, brands and converters were occupied with filling the shelves to overcome supply chain issues and meet demand. This shifted during 2022-2023, and we have seen the level of demand begin to decrease amidst the cost-of-living crisis, which is leaving a lasting impact on brands, businesses and converters.
There is a co-creation nation: customers have become increasingly involved in co-creating with brands, and finding their position within the innovation market. It is through social channels we are seeing consumers creatively express their interests, opinions and voice. The end result: brands are identifying creative talent and embedding the consumer perspective into their marketing campaings and product design, to stay ahead.
Printers and converters are focused on digitalising and automating their entire workflow to be more flexible and more agile. In fact, 62% of suppliers surveyed in Esko’s Packaging Trends survey, conducted in December of 2022, believe automation had the highest positive impact on the way they managed their business in 2022. This number is only increasing, as 73% believe automation will have the biggest impact on packaging in their industry in 2023.
How have the continuing economic and market specific challenges affected you and your customers during 2023 – have you had to do anything differently to adapt/react?
The market challenges can be summarised in a few words: exponential growth of jobs to be managed. In this context HP continues to design productive presses but we add technologies going beyond printing processes to ensure the entire production flow is effective. It is critical we tackle productivity in a comprehensive manner with technology and partnerships. To best illustrate these points, the HP Indigo V12 digital press delivers optimal efficiency, flexibility, sustainability and ROI across almost all kind of print volume. The HP 200K is the most productive digital solution for short-run pouch production.
We’re increasingly seeing new entrants from the commercial printing world breaking into the packaging industry, particularly focused on short-run labels and folding carton – the latter thanks to their equipment that cope with carton stock, like the HP 15K. The commercial printers are as well very familiar with digital printing and fast turnaround times, making them a good partner to work with.
What do you expect to be the main trends, key industry developments, and biggest opportunities for printers in 2024?
For now, public attitudes seem surprisingly positive towards AI - at least in relation to workplace applications. AI is poised to create a whole new way of working and within the printing and packaging industry it will probably trigger more versioning of content. They will as well be of significant importance for predictive and preventive maintenance.
(Additional response for this question provided below by John Meiling, HP senior director of marketing and category management OEM inkjet for specialty printing solutions)
Post-pandemic labour costs and shortages will have packaging manufacturers opting for more automation in multiple areas - that can seamlessly integrate onto the factory floor. From pre-press automation software, to colour management, quality control, and of course substrates handling performed by robots.
Major packaging equipment manufacturers are investing in or acquiring robotics companies – eg Durst P5 and Bobst Dücker Robotics. Within less than five years, factories producing packaging in an 'Industry 4.0' format will become a reality. Although these dark factories will only address a small portion of production, the course has been set. Last, new technologies enable new players to build new business models offering services not available before like what ePac does in flexible packaging around the HP 200K platform.
2D barcodes: As technology advances, 2D barcodes will offer consumers more engaging and informative interactions with brands. High quality printing will be in demand and more serialisation will become reality to the benefits of brand owners who can track and trace all goods across the supply chain.
Increased sustainability regulation: Amid regulation and growing environmental concerns, sustainable packaging will be at the forefront of innovation with a surge in eco-friendly materials over harmful plastics.
What are your hopes and expectations for Drupa 2024?
HP’s ambition for Drupa 2024 is to share in depth and comprehensive solutions aiming at answering customers pain points – especially the management of larger amounts of jobs. The HP booth will be a must see to understand how to optimise printing and production workflows, optimise energy and waste, and how HP’s digital presses meet sustainability requirements for printers, converters and brand owners.
From a wider industry perspective, we expect to see digital, automation and sustainability to be at the centre of the communications. HP, in close collaboration with partners, is committed to continue to lead the industry transformation from conventional process to digitalised production processes.
AI (artificial intelligence) has been one of the hot topics of 2023 – what opportunities and threats do you think it poses for print in 2024 and beyond?
AI has been around for a long time, and HP has been at the forefront of using AI and analytics for optimising operations and enhancing customer experience. Moving forward, we see the impact of AI, and especially generative AI accelerating the simplification of interaction of humans with print machines and systems. As a direct impact, generative AI will bring a new life of opportunities for digital print, where consumers and customers will increasingly want to print their own creations, each being unique. Now is the period of democratised creativity, and we foresee a deluge of creators. On the operating efficiency side, AI will help simplify print operations, by becoming a human intuitive bridge between tech intensive operating procedures, and complex systems to run press operations.
For print solutions companies like HP, AI is going to help provide superior customer service with predictive interventions preventing downtime, faster resolution with on demand knowledge and significant contextual awareness. And above all, the adoption of these new technologies will help attract young talent to the print workforce, which recently has been a challenge for the industry.
How can suppliers better help printers navigate the challenges and seize the opportunities in 2024?
HP, as one of the main equipment manufacturers for the printing and packaging industry, is committed to contributing to making the more flexible, responsive, and adaptive to brand owners' and consumers' requirements. The HP solutions are available now and they will help printers and converters in managing growth, addressing more complex and more demanding printing jobs and new packaging requirements, overcoming environmental constraints, optimising brand owners' supply chain, implementing new regulations, attracting new talent to the industry, developing new business models like web-to-pack, and welcoming new entrants from the commercial printing world is the new packaging landscape. Yes, more will be made available in the future but today’s HP solutions are robust and already designed to cope with a more digitalised future.
Note: This prediction is taken from a special Briefing article in the new issue of Printweek featuring insights from industry suppliers, hence it does not follow the same question template as the other predictions.
