What Is Your Hybrid Press Used to Print?
Similarly: What are printers going to do with their hybrid presses?
Last year, 75 percent of respondents said they intended to expand into new applications. Some have seemingly done that, as now less than 60 percent say they plan to expand. On the to-do lists of more than 40 percent this year is to enhance automated workflows, a leap from just 13 percent who pledged to do so in 2017’s poll. Roughly 29 percent of printers said they plan to use their hybrid machines to provide faster delivery from press to shelf.
The single greatest change year over year came from printers’ usage of inline finishing and converting equipment on their hybrid machinery.
There was a nearly even split in 2017’s poll, with 55 percent stating they did not incorporate finishing and 45 percent stating they did. Those numbers have changed dramatically in 2018: Better than 80 percent now feature the added capability on their hybrid presses, and just under 17 percent do not.
Customer demand continues to be the No. 1 driver for adopting hybrid printing.
Of the other possible reasons from which respondents could choose—short-run capabilities, enhanced productivity, improved control of processes, fit into automated workflows and the catchall “all of the above”—only the next-to-last option received no votes. Feedback was similarly spread out last year, although “fit into automated workflows” did garner 13 percent of votes then.