When Komori and Heidelberg drop out of a Graph Expo show, it portends seismic changes in the printing industry. But it is all part of 500+ years of changes. All things have a lifespan, whether they are living things, inanimate things, or even the universe (the ultimate collection of things). They start out as nothing, become something, and ultimately become nothing again. This pseudo-philosophical statement begins a discussion about technological change, a subject dear to all of our hearts.
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Heidelberg & Komori pass on Graph Expo 2010; KBA, manroland and Presstek to exhibit
Print CEO: Heidelberg, Komori not exhibiting at Graph Expo
The handset typesetting (and letterpress printing) era began in 1439 and ended in 1970 (500+ years).
(Actually printing hobbyists may keep letterpress going forever.)
The machine typesetting era began in 1886 and ended in 1986 (100 years).
The phototypesetting era began in 1945 and ended around 1990 (45 years).
The laser imagesetting era began in 1978 and ended in 2008 (30 years).
The off-press CTP era began in 1991 and will probably last until 2020 (30 years).
The on-press CTP era began in 1991 and may extend farther into the future.
The digital printing era began in 1976 and may extend far into the future.
Every technology solves a problem, often replacing the previous technology. Handset typesetting became machine typesetting which became phototypesetting which became laser imagesetting which then disappeared in the CTP and digital printing worlds. Off-press CTP will probably be supplanted with on-press CTP or to a re-usable image carrier. It is reasonable to expect that digital printing, the ultimate CTP approach, will affect the longevity of offset litho, as well as flexo.
Lithography was around for over 100 years before it became offset and another 60 years before it replaced letterpress. Based on the past, would it be incorrect to predict a supplement or replacement for offset litho? On-press CTP addresses the makeready problem, reducing makeready to a few minutes to perhaps one minute. There are now four major reproduction technologies and all will be affected by on-press CTP technology.
The life cycle of technology
New technology begins with some enabling breakthrough. Senefelder found the perfect kind of stone that made lithography work. Moyroud and Higgonnet found the Xenon flashlamp for stroboscopically imaging characters photographically. CTP was born because the laser became commercially available. These enabling technologies are integrated into new approaches and they challenges the status quo. Because it is at an early stage of development, acceptance is restrained, but slowly it improves and is accepted, eventually replacing the status quo. And thus becoming the new status quo.
Improvement versus innovation
Along the way the new technology is improved. It is advanced in speed, quality, and capability. Users upgrade from model to model and version to version. In predicting technological change, the most important consideration is distinguishing between improvement and innovation. Innovation is a paradigm shift—something so different that it changes the way things are.
Digital printing
In the late 1970s the first digital printers were introduced. The IBM 3800 had a lightning speed of 215 pages per minute, but a resolution of 240 dpi and severe font limitations, and was intended to replace line printers. Printed output in the mainframe computer environment was generated on mechanical impact printers—dot matrix printers, chain printers, train printers, flying-drum printers, and others. The 3800, was faster, quieter, more flexible, and did not use pin-fed green bar paper. The Xerox 9700, introduced in 1978, printed 120 pages per minute at 300 dpi. Fonts were stored in memory (at 8KB to 32KB of bitmap memory, for about 8 fonts at 10 point). A separate font was needed for each different size, and larger sizes used more memory. Fonts could also be downloaded along with the job to be printed. The 9700 found applications in legal and financial markets, technical documentation, insurance forms and policies, and tax returns. The 9700 became the 8700 which became the 5700 which became the 2700, which, in 1980, was part of the Star office system that gave the world the mouse, a graphical user interface, the local area network, and more. The Apple Laserwriter and HP Laserjet came in the 1980s. The Xerox Docutech came in 1990. The color Xeikon and Indigo came in 1993. The 3800/9700 revolutionized the data center, later the HP LaserJet revolutionized the office, and the digital color printers are revolutionizing the printing industry.
The 3800/9700 and its ilk created an entire industry of laser printing for mainframe (and eventually office) output. The two segments converged with the growth of PostScript. Audience-of-one documents, and the efficiencies of “distribute then print” or “just-in-time printing” are still not fully realized in today’s world. We have output devices with full color, high resolution, and print speeds comparable to analog processes that we could have only dreamed about when the industry began.
Our definition of digital printing includes any technology that electronically and instantaneously creates the image carrier on a reproduction device and produces dry commercially acceptable output from the first printed unit. It makes no difference whether ink or toner is used.
The workflow era
We are moving beyond the reproduction device as the core of our system to process integration, where the workflow is the most important consideration. This is the focus of CIP4 and the Job Description Format (JDF). For workflow automation to really work, all parts of the process that start with a creative idea and result in a printed product must be integrated. Right now we are tweaking and improving the component parts of our systems. Simultaneously, we are developing innovative approaches that integrate the Web and print.
In the 1970s, the major exhibitors at Graph Expo were phototypesetting suppliers. In the 1990s, they were CTP suppliers. Today, they are digital printing suppliers. By not participating at Graph Expo, Komori and Heidelberg are only confirming the inevitability of history.
