Toray said that it expected to see growth in waterless printing as more printers looked to take advantage of its combination of high print quality and environmental benefits.

UK distributor Classic Graphics, which is a subsidiary of ink specialist Classic Colours, added that the process would allow printers to diversify their client offering.

Managing director David Grey said: "If a print company wants to spread and increase its customer base then waterless UV printing will give it a much wider range of products to sell.

"It can be used for printing on paper, board, plastics, film and foils and is popular in security printing, as well as CD/DVD printing, bank and loyalty card printing, and printing things like plant labels for nurseries."

However, Grey added that while waterless printing had found quite a lot of niches, growth in other areas such as commercial printing with conventional inks had been slow.

"Specialist waterless UV areas are where we're looking at expansion, but there's no reason why it can't be used for any type of print – it's simply a matter of the printing industry wanting to do it," he said.

"You can convert a press to waterless as long as you put the right kit on to control the temperature and if it's a modern press then it's already got water cooling, so you just need to boost that and put in sensors to allow thermostatic control."

Toray is currently developing a chemistry-free plate for waterless UV printing, as well as a plate for long-run coldset and heatset production for newspaper printers, although no release date has been announced yet for either product.

The manufacturer also hopes to set up a UK demonstration facility in cooperation with Classic Graphics, although Grey said that they did not yet have a press manufacturer with a UK showroom to partner with. "We are talking to one or two people, but as yet nothing has been finalised," he added.