Digital printing continues to eat away at convential print technologies and according to a new report by UK-based Pira International, the global electrophotographic printing market, that was worth US$57.6 billion in 2009, and is expected to grow to almost US$90 billion by 2015.
Electrophotographic printing technologies encompass digital print engines which transfer an image to a substrate using an electrostatic process, usually using toner (think Xerox iGen, Canon, Kodak Nexpress, HP Indigo, Océ, Xeikon, Konica Minolta, Ricoh and more).
The projected volume growth from 2009 to 2015 for this segment of the commercial printing market is from some 761 billion to 904 billion letter-sized impressions. The increase in volume and significant growth in value correlates to an increased use of colour and variable data printing expected.
According to the report, the fastest expanding applications of electrophotographic print by 2015, leading to the increase in dollar value, are going to be labels, books, magazines, packaging and catalogues.
General commercial printing is currently the largest segment by value in the electrophotographic market, with a 56 percent share in 2009. However, according to Pira, its proportion is going to shrink in the coming years. The report predicts that during 2005–15 the fastest growing segments of the toner-based print market are going to be books, magazines, catalogues, and packaging—labels in particular.
On the other hand, the few newspapers that are being printed with electrophotography today will transition to the more cost effective inkjet technologies which are currently coming to market.
Pira also predicts digital book printing with toner devices will decline over the 2010 to 2015 period as monochrome text transfers to inkjet technology. The report also forecasts declines in direct mail and transactional volume for electrophotographic devices, also due to replacement of large volumes of mono overprinting with full colour inkjet.
Packaging is the bright spot for colour electrophotography, with its share continuing to increase quickly.
Based on extensive primary research, The Future of Colour Electrophotographic Printing to 2015 – Market and Technology Forecasts, reveals that the importance of electrophotography in the printing industry is growing. Electrophotography currently accounts for 9.4 percent of the value of the global print market (which they peg at US$654 billion in 2010), which is up from the 2009’s 8.7 percent and the 4.3 percent recorded in 2004.
This growth is only predicted to accelerate, as the report puts electrophotography’s share in the global print market in 2014 at 13 percent, almost 50 percent more than in 2009. Digital print processes (both electrophotography and inkjet) are forecast to generally gain share from conventional print technologies, primarily offset litho. The exception is flexography, which is the one conventional technology expected to grow over the 2004 to 2014 period as it is used primarily in the growth market of packaging.
