The Japanese manufacturer has ambitious growth plans in commercial printing, telling the audience at this week’s Drupa International Media Conference in Düsseldorf that it plans to double revenue from large-format printers and quadruple revenue in industrial printing, a division that currently comprises just one label press.
In an exclusive interview with ProPrint, the US$11.7 billion company’s president, Minoru Usui, was bullish about Epson’s prospects for the label market. “We are confident we can become not just the price leader but also the quality leader.”
Epson’s inkjet heads are based on micro-piezo technology – a technology that Mr Usui is personally credited with commercialising in 1988 as head of the company’s then fledgling inkjet development department.
The first label machine to utilise the printheads was the Epson Surepress L-4033A, which was announced in time for Ipex 2010 and launched in Australia last year.
At Drupa 2012, Epson will showcase a new concept press, codenamed the Surepress X, which will be the first Epson machine to use LED-curable inks. Impressively, the new device’s footprint is just half the size of the Surepress L-4033A.
Usui conceded that the lower price of Epson’s label machines would be the key differentiator in the digital label market, which is dominated by HP Indigo, but he said that beyond price, he was confident that micro-piezo inkjet has “a strong competitive advantage over other technology on the market”.
Epson’s latest wide-format machine, the SureColor SC-30600, was first unveiled earlier this month at the Fespa show in Barcelona. It is expected to be just the first in a new family of POS and signage printers, with all future wide-format machine set to come under the SureColor name.
Currently, Epson’s focus has been on the fine art and graphics end of the market with devices that have developed out if its heritage with proofers, such as the Stylus Pro range, but Usui said there was no reason why micro-piezo machines shouldn’t make headway in the flatbed or grand-format sphere.
The printheads already appear on the 3.2 metre-wide Monna Lisa textile printer, jointly manufactured with Italian firm Robustelli.
Epson expects to make a bigger land grab for the textiles printing market following news it has acquired a 50% stake in another Italian firm, For Tex.
Speaking to ProPrint, Usui said that while sales of consumer products currently constitute about 80% of Epson’s printing revenues, he hoped the split with commercial printing would eventually become more like 50-50.
“Micro piezo has the strong potential to become the number one technology in all markets,” he said.
Rounding off its pre-Drupa announcements, Epson also unveiled a new six-colour photo printer, the SureLab SL-D3000. The device is aimed squarely at the photographic market, offering sizes up to A3 and a maximum resoluton of 1,440×1,440dpi.
Drupa takes place in Düsseldorf, Germany on 3-16 May 2012.
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