The US consultancy found that less than 20% of companies it interviewed had set up a company-wide e-procurement facility for print or paper, despite the fact that 85% of those surveyed had used online tools to buy print and paper.

Holly Muscolino, director of CAP Ventures production workflow solutions service and joint co-author of The new corporate print customer: a profile of a market in transition, said the take-up of internet-based procurement technology was still in the early stages.

Despite the end of the dotcom boom, the internet is still a growing technology, with adoption continuing to grow, she added.

Only 17% of all respondents were operating an e-procurement system. But, this grew to 30% of companies with revenues between 63m ($100m) and 630m, and 60% for those with revenues of more than 630m.

Of companies surveyed, 23% of their total print spending was conducted via the internet, a figure expected to grow to 32.5% over the next two years.

CAP has also produced a new report on effective personalised communications in business strategies.

Visit: www.capv.com.

A three-volume series of reports from Pira covers the future of digital colour printing to 2008. The three volumes cover technology, the European market and key global markets. They cost 6,200.

Key findings
Less than a fifth of respondents companies had a corporate-wide e-procurement system
Only 14% of print buyers organisations were using an e-procurement system specifically for buying print and paper
A fifth of print spending is conducted via the internet
Around 13% of print becomes obsolete before it can be used
Source: CAP Ventures

Contact: 01372 802080.

Story by Andy Scott