04/20/2020
Dear Reader,
The prevailing Covid-19 crisis disrupted our daily routines. Digital processes have almost entirely replaced manual handling and face to face communication in many businesses and public life. Until recently we saw digitization happening in gradual steps, with enough time to adapt and hence ‘easy to digest’. But now everyone’s digital journey is dramatically accelerating. What does this mean for the printing industry? On the first glance nothing good. Where are the printed leaflets for local attractions, hotels, restaurants and other kinds of trade? It is also a while that I held an inflight magazine in my hands. On the other hand, the dramatically increased hygiene standards and demand for properly packed products such as food, pharmaceutical, medical and household articles have generated additional workload for a good number of packaging printers. And printed books, too, are an effective means for spending long weekends at home. I was amazed about the crowd in the bookshop one day before the announced lockdown became effective.
There are many voices saying that business and public life won’t be the same after this crisis. If this is true, then we all need to be flexible. A wave of unknown products and services will come to the market and require printing. Maybe a different type of printing or job structure but posing new opportunities in any case. New regulations are likely to be introduced, too, which will have an impact and foster digital processes and further automation not only on the press but also in production control and bindery. We at Heidelberg think that this crisis will result in eliminating unnecessary manual ‘touch points’ and therefore we focus on automation and integration in the printshop in this and the following issues of our newsletter.
Please stay safe and healthy.
Yours sincerely
Thomas Frank
MD, Heidelberg Asia Pacific
04/20/2020
Dear Reader,
The prevailing Covid-19 crisis disrupted our daily routines. Digital processes have almost entirely replaced manual handling and face to face communication in many businesses and public life. Until recently we saw digitization happening in gradual steps, with enough time to adapt and hence ‘easy to digest’. But now everyone’s digital journey is dramatically accelerating. What does this mean for the printing industry? On the first glance nothing good. Where are the printed leaflets for local attractions, hotels, restaurants and other kinds of trade? It is also a while that I held an inflight magazine in my hands. On the other hand, the dramatically increased hygiene standards and demand for properly packed products such as food, pharmaceutical, medical and household articles have generated additional workload for a good number of packaging printers. And printed books, too, are an effective means for spending long weekends at home. I was amazed about the crowd in the bookshop one day before the announced lockdown became effective.
There are many voices saying that business and public life won’t be the same after this crisis. If this is true, then we all need to be flexible. A wave of unknown products and services will come to the market and require printing. Maybe a different type of printing or job structure but posing new opportunities in any case. New regulations are likely to be introduced, too, which will have an impact and foster digital processes and further automation not only on the press but also in production control and bindery. We at Heidelberg think that this crisis will result in eliminating unnecessary manual ‘touch points’ and therefore we focus on automation and integration in the printshop in this and the following issues of our newsletter.
Please stay safe and healthy.
Yours sincerely
Thomas Frank
MD, Heidelberg Asia Pacific
