The terms “green” and “inkjet” drupa have been used by many western trade journalists to describe the main themes of drupa08. While these are fitting descriptions of the event as a whole, Naresh Khanna attempts to review the exhibition from the Indian printer’s point of view.

At drupa08 Indian printers were impressed by digital printing as never before for at least two reasons: Firstly, there is a wider choice of companies and products in the Indian market beyond the venerable Xerox, HP and Kodak – in the last year Konica Minolta and Canon have established their digital colour press sales in this market and now Xeikon, Oce, and Ricoh are also threatening to do the same.

Secondly, the growth of the economy and industry have meant that there are finally a sufficient number of printers who have bought land, new offset presses, CtPs, and have bought or are buying postpress and workflow – they have reached that place on the shopping list where digital printing is coming into sharper focus. So now when the technology works (version 2), there is variety and choice, the prices are competitive, and the Indians are ready.

Nevertheless, we believe that the strongest signings or purchases at the show by Indian customers were for offset presses. We maintain that offset press deals worth more than US$ 80 million were signed at or around the show – about half and half for both web and sheetfed offset presses. Ultimately these and other orders will amount to US$ 200 million (INR 800 crore) in the current financial year ending on March 31, 2008. However there is some apprehension that printers may be buying machines under the EPCG scheme, which foregoes customs tariffs in exchange for export commitments that are not always easy to fulfil.

Akiyama
KK Printing the Akiyama dealers in the country report that there were a large number of enquiries for the Akiyama J-Print stack press. Although the company still faces challenges from a lack of understanding or appreciation of the simultaneous front and back perfecting technology, and to some extent from the used machinery market, the conservative estimate is that there will be some gain on the four units installed last year at Thomson’s Aeroli plant near Mumbai. Apparently Thomson is quite happy with its 2 + 2, 32 x 44-inch press and while it prints a lot of bookwork on very thin bible stock, it is also effectively used in two passes for 4 + 4 calendars on coated stock.

Heidelberg
Klaus Nielsen took a team of twenty-five Heidelberg India staff to drupa08 and at times he found even this resource stretched by the volume of visitors. The team exceeded its considerable targets and was pleasantly surprised by the stronger than expected interest in both Heidelberg prepress and postpress equipment. It seems that Heidelberg’s prepress including its CtP offerings have gained traction quickly and that the JDF ready Prinect workflow plays a healthy role in opting for a complete solution that will one day integrate prepress, pressroom, postpress, colour management, production workflow and management information into a seamless print factory.

The interest in presses remained extremely strong especially by printers in the smaller cities and towns described as tier 2 and tier 3 cities. There was a strong buyer trend upward from A2 to A1 size presses. Interest was shown in all the three Heidelberg A1 varieties — CD 102, SM102 and the XL105 although more Indian buyers tend to commit to the CD and SM in the A1 size. However, in the A2 size there seems to be a strong buyer preference for the newly introduced XL75 press. This is attributed both to the fact that it is a universal press for paper and board and to the slightly larger maximum sheet size — good for both book and packaging printers and the speed capability of 18,000 sheets an hour.

Apparently the devaluation of the Indian Rupee just before drupa in respect to both the Euro and the Yen did not dampen buying interest. In fact it is felt that because the currency fluctuation preceded the show and held steady at drupa08, the buyers were not unnerved.

KBA — York Print buy Rapida 105 UV press
At drupa, KBA announced the purchase by York Print of Kolkata of a fully UV equipped 6-colour Rapida 105 plus coater press and extended delivery for cartonboard and plastic printing. The medium-format Rapida at York will be the first UV press for printing plastic in the whole of the eastern subcontinent. York Print is a repeat customer having bought a succession of Planeta presses and a Rapida 104 in 1993.

York Print’s management team visited all the major press manufacturers at drupa, but in the end they were most impressed by the Rapida 105’s ability to accommodate the company’s specific production requirements, and KBA’s acknowledged competence in UV and plastic printing technology.

KBA’s dealer Indo-Polygraph machinery also met with considerable success with its binding equipment from Wohlenburg and expects that by the end of the financial year it will sell several more KBA Rapida presses in our market.

Komori
Although Komori’s Indian dealers at drupa were fairly non-committal, they are hopeful of continued strong sales in a market they really began to explore at the last drupa. In the last year they have sold about twenty sheetfed presses in our market in addition to three heatset webs and it is likely that this upward trend will continue.

Speaking with the distributors, one can conservatively estimate that Komori will install from 20 to 30 sheetfed presses and three to five heatset webs in this financial year in the Indian market. At drupa there was strong interest in the LS29 model and in many cases customers are looking at buying these presses in a 5-colour plus coater configuration.

manroland
The change in the company’s name has more meaning for our markets since it comes just a few months after its direct entry and presence in our market. We believe that this increased level of activity found some resonance among Indian buyers at the show. Manroland has always had the major share of web offset presses imported by Indian newspapers and we believe that at drupa significant purchases or signings took place.

The sheetfed press side was also very successful with signings for at least 24 units at the show with major customers including Orient Press of Mumbai and Sona Offset in New Delhi. Since these sheetfed orders are already equal to last year’s sales one can reasonably expect manroland to double its sales in this market this financial year.

Mitsubishi
The reaction to Mitsubishi’s new Diamond V series presses both straight and perfecting was largely positive from Indian customers. The increased automation and modernised product design with multicolour LEDS in the unit covers are a good response to those who found the old Diamond machine good value, but outdated in terms of glamour and glitz.

Mitsubishi’s distributor Proteck conservatively reports sales of at least six or seven presses at drupa and it can be reasonably estimated that about thirty to thirty-five presses will be installed in this financial year. Some of these are of course overflow of orders taken last year. A very large number of these presses will be more than 4-colours and a significant number will include coaters, extended deliveries, and UV interdeck and end of press curing.

Proteck also had great success with its prepress and postpress solutions from Screen and Horizon and will also likely sell at least one or two Screen Truepress 344 DI presses into the Indian market. This highly automated digital press answers Proteck’s need for a small format offset press to compliment their Mitsubishi formats.

Ryobi
IEM Ryobi’s Indian dealer had a very successful show with 50 to 60 visitors a day coming to the Ryobi, Kolbus, and Aster stands. The company has already taken 2 orders for the 1050 for which deliveries will begin next March and there is serious interest in buying their 920 presses with coater that are now being offered. Some of these deals are expected to be finalised at the All in Print show at Shanghai in November.

Altogether one can expect more than a dozen Ryobi presses to be installed in our market in the current financial year. In addition, IEM was able to book orders for four new Kolbus lines and eight Aster book sewing machines of which three have already been shipped. An Osako saddle stitching line was also bought.

Sakurai
Ajay Gandhi, Sakurai’s Indian dealer, reports that drupa was a huge success for our market and the worldwide market. Sakurai was the first Japanese press manufacturer to take part in drupa and this was the company’s eleventh drupa. Some of the Indian printers are paying attention to the environment issues and they spent considerable time studying Sakurai’s waterless offset press which was also shown at the Toray stand.

Sakurai continues its strong sales of its silkscreen cylinder press with both Utility Print of Ahmedabad and Manipal Power Press placing orders at the show. Two or three press orders will be confirmed in the near term — mostly in the 19 x 26-inch format but there is also interest in the larger sizes, which Sakurai is putting into mass production. There is significant interest from Indian customers in the larger size press in a fully UV 6-colour plus coater with extended delivery configuration.

Ajay Gandhi reports that Indian currency fluctuation against the Yen does seem to be a concern for smaller printers. Sometimes they will place an order and delay competition of the process in the hopes of a more favourable exchange rate two or three months down the line.