Visions of the future

Boiling down Drupa to a short, sharp summary is no easy task. Wandering the 17 bustling halls of the Messe Düsseldorf, it could be hard to see the forest for the trees, to see the trends for the technology. In some halls, the talk was all about disruptive technology. In others, the rise of the Asian manufacturers. Look again, it seemed the overall trend was one of vendor consolidation.

Putting aside trend spotting, there was one theme that unified Drupa 2012 – optimism. It’s no surprise why. There were tens of thousands of people from all walks of the greater printing population, all under one roof, pulling in one direction. In our day to day, print is a channel under threat: from dwindling advertising budgets, from overcapacity, from new media. But within ‘fortress Düsseldorf’, every visitors and exhibitors was an ambassador for the printed page, determined that it will remain a relevant and viable medium.

How to gauge whether this optimism was real? For suppliers, the measurement was leads and orders. Within days of Drupa’s opening, exhibitors had begun to talk up the success of their presentations. Kodak, one company that needs successes more than many, claimed to have reached 50% of its overall sales target by day four. Major sales announcements from the bright yellow booth included the fourth Prosper 5000XL press bought by 50,000-staff Japanese giant Toppan Printing.