With all the excitement surrounding the Heidelberg versus Xerox battle for the digital print market, it is tempting to get caught up in the hype With all the excitement surrounding the Heidelberg versus Xerox battle for the digital print market, it is tempting to get caught up in the hype. But maybe we should be taking a step back to get a wider view? Maybe neither will be the techno choice long term? Maybe the future of digital printing isn't a cloud of toner, but a spindrift of liquid ink? Given the range of players developing inkjet printing systems this technology could be the most likely contender, if for no other reason than its ubiquity. There is a huge range of uses for which inkjet printing technology has been developed and advances are continuing. Whether printing on carpets or eggs, creating prepress proofs or billboards, or doing simple office printing, it seems that inkjet technology is the preferred option. This plurality of development suggests that inkjet technology has a more than long-term viability. More interestingly the solution of problems for other applications improves prospects for their resolution within the commercial printing industry.

The industrial heavyweights There are plenty of applications within the industry that might point to inkjet printing's future. However it is not proofing, wide, or superwide format devices, nor consumer and office printing that points to this technology's future for the printing industry. It is in industrial applications for very high-speed inkjet printing devices that future possibilities can best be glimpsed. Although most of the devices for industrial applications fall short of the quality standards required for commercial print, the technology has developed rapidly in the last couple of years. It is this pace of development that suggests a rosy future for inkjet: it still has a long way to go and its potential is far from tapped.

At Drupa two years ago, at least six companies demonstrated industrial inkjet devices but only a handful have continued with developments. The devices on show were printing on a variety of substrates, mostly for packaging, wall coverings, textiles and the like. These high-speed inkjet printers are designed for throughput and robustness, and for printing on anything including paper, plastics, fabrics and metals. Following the show many people expressed the opinion that inkjet printing is the future for digital presses, although since then the market has been pretty muted. At IPEX we saw some significant progress however. As with other sectors in the graphic arts, the industrial inkjet printing community has seen consolidation.

For applications where high quality is the priority, Barco Graphics' technology demonstration at Drupa has now matured into an impressive product. The so-called 'the. factory' technology was on show at IPEX under the Dotrix name. Barco has sold off the division that developed the. factory, and the new company trades as Dotrix. The technology is based on the Toshiba Tec greyscale head, a head that is based on Xaar's technology and prints 3-bit greyscale per spot at a resolution of 300 dpi. The. factory is capable of printing speeds of up to 907 sq. metres per hour.

Dotrix are selling the. factory as a complete system or on an OEM basis with the SPICE (Single Pass Inkjet Colour Engine) engine available for integration into other systems, including presses. The Dotrix digital front-end is based on the Barco Graphics Printstreamer II technology for high volume variable content RIPping and output management. This too is available on an OEM basis. The cost of the device obviously depends on the configuration, but is estimated to be around US$1 to 1.5 million.

Also at IPEX was Scitex Digital Printing, a wholly owned subsidiary of Scitex Corporation. Scitex Digital Printing has been developing its inkjet technologies for some thirty years and now boasts over 5000 systems worldwide. The company is one of the leading developers for continuous inkjet systems. Continuous inkjet technology is very fast with systems running at 1,000 feet per and capable of printing more than 4,000 A4 pages per minute, in the Scitex Digital Printing engines. Primarily used for billing, books and direct mail applications the company's core technology is capable of imaging 300 metres per minute. At IPEX Scitex Digital Printing demonstrated the latest version of its Versamark device. Versamark Vantage is a colour variable information printing system priced at less than US$1 million and capable of printing up to 800 A4 pages per minute.

One company present at Drupa but not at IPEX was Aprion, despite the fact that it recently received substantial investment boosts from IBM and Hitachi. The company's MAGIC (Multiple Graphic Array Inkjet Colour) drop-on-demand technology had been under development at Scitex for seven years prior to the formation of Aprion early in 2000. The technology is due for imminent release within a range of monochrome and colour devices. Aprion uses a Piezo-electric stimulus to push pigmented water-based ink through the nozzle aperture into a sponge, which acts as an interim reservoir for the ink. The developers claim the device is capable of higher speeds because of this improved ink flow. The jets in this press have a multi-layered construction that is only 1.5 mm thick. Aprion claim it is possible to configure heads of any length or width, depending on the speed and format demands of the application. The company has developed a range of sector-specific engines.

At Drupa, Aprion's demonstration machine was printing 600 dpi monochrome at one metre per second, equivalent to 200 sq. metres per hour. Each nozzle's firing rate is 25,000 drops per nozzle per second and the company has achieved 100,000, under laboratory conditions. Designed for wallpaper, packaging and graphic arts applications, the MAGIC prints onto any substrate. Devices are expected to cost from US$600 to $1 million, depending on the particular print model and its final configuration. The technology is in final beta testing for colour and monochrome versions, with commercial release due later this year.

At Drupa the Aprion technology was binary, laying down a droplet or not depending on the presence or absence of a pixel. A greyscale lays down different drop sizes and so multiple drops can be laid down to build up individual pixels. A multi-level device thus prints smoother tonal transitions than a binary device because it does not require such a high resolution. This is likely to be Aprion's next development.

The leading supplier of print head technology is Xaar, whose heads are used in all sorts of print engines. Xaar's drop-on-demand Piezo technology is capable of very high quality and is available in various guises. Since we covered the company a couple of years ago, Xaar (see also IPP November 1999 issue, pp. 21-23) has moved all head manufacturing to Sweden, and has seen the inevitable slowdown in its rapid early growth. This is in part consistent with the general graphic arts market downturn, but it is also due to reduced licensing revenues, themselves a result of economic depression. The company has licensing arrangements with various printer manufacturers including Seiko and Toshiba.

Inky fingers A fundamental part of any investment decision is the consumables, since this is where the costs hopefully continue long after the machine has been purchased. There is an intimate link between the print head and the ink. The choice of inks depends heavily on the application and commercial requirements. Manufacturers work closely with ink companies to develop consumables optimised for their technology. The intimate relationship of ink, print head and application means that there is a broad array of inks available and a complex web of interrelationships between developers and distributors. Specialist inks have been developed to complement the various engines, including solvent inks, dye-sublimation inks, pigmented oil-based inks and UV curable inks. The UV curable inks are necessary for devices that print onto non-porous substrates. UV inks are used for printing on plastics such as PVC, polypropylene and polycarbonate, and metals such as copper and steel. Water-based inks are also being developed for printing on vinyl and textiles.

In May 1999 Xaar's view was that the market would be worth over $40 billion by the year 2002, a claim that has proved to be somewhat optimistic. However the on-demand printing market as defined in terms of turnaround speed and the capacity for personalisation does have huge growth capacity. The markets for this technology should indeed be measured in billions rather than millions. New applications for inkjet printing keep appearing and few of the old ones fade entirely away. When one considers the many technologies vying for supremacy in digital printing, few are being developed for such a diversity of purposes as inkjet. This technology doesn't get hyped as much as its rivals, and its evolution is still in the early stages. However, for commercial printers not yet sure that digital printing is for them, inkjet is certainly one to watch for the future.