What do you feel were the main trends and key industry developments in 2024?
Once again, a tough year for the industry evidenced by mergers, acquisitions and sadly businesses closing their doors. But I do see changes in client demand and opportunities for broadening service offerings to deliver insight that results in increased relevance to the end client. It was noticeable that the back end of 2024 saw a number of leading commentators and agencies re-engage with print as part of the marketing mix, we need to put a foot in this opening door and shout out loud in 2025 about the tangible results achieved when using print. Businesses in our sector really started to see benefit from embracing higher levels of automation driven by data, analytics and AI but this is just the start.

What do you expect to be the main trends, key industry developments, and biggest opportunities for printers in 2025?
The themes remain common, align to maximising today’s business whilst shaping services and client values for the future. These will be driven by the unstoppable rise in the pace of digital transformation whether in-house or through broader service offerings. Our focus is on five areas: ultra efficient production environments; workflow solutions that monetise every minute; unrivalled service delivery; higher standards of security; and sustainability at the heart of what we do.

What are Xerox’s own hopes and aims for 2025? Can you tell us about anything exciting in the pipeline?
To continue our Re-Invention drive, aligned to today's and tomorrow's opportunities and be committed to becoming a business relevant to our customers' success. With print at its heart we are redefining our proposition for the future, utilising and embracing AI, analytics and automation whilst aligning and integrating clients and consumer work patterns, whether that be served from a central production environment, the office, the home or even mobile.

How can suppliers better help printers navigate the challenges and seize the opportunities in 2025?
Companies need to continue to embrace broader service offerings that complement the core print production with the customer experience at the forefront of the client engagement, solving challenges, supporting end clients' customers and opening new markets. A great example of this is the work that Go Inspire, a Xerox company, do to go beyond print, supporting the client experience (CX), with data insight and marketing performance leading to significantly higher campaign ROI. When print and digital combine, it can be so powerful.

ESG and sustainability will continue to be a big play for printers as more and more clients set high expectations of their suppliers to have clear programs and measurements in place to manage their carbon emissions and their social impact in the communities in which they operate.