HP will overtake Heidelberg as the biggest exhibitor at drupa 2016, taking over a whole hall as digital print shapes up to take centre stage at the mega show.
HP will showcase its full digital and wide format range in a monster 6200sqm stand taking up the whole of hall 17, which is 24 per cent bigger than its 4952sqm footprint in 2012.
European marketing director Ronen Zioni told ProPrint sister magazine PrintWeek that the stand will include never-seen-before innovation.
“This is a big, big investment from our side and the next project for us and all our divisions. Indigo, PageWide and Latex are all geared towards drupa,” he says.
“Drupa is not just druck and papier anymore. We have a very serious offering around packaging and this is very much aligned with the drupa team’s ambitions, they are looking for innovation. They were very receptive of our wish to be the biggest exhibitor.”
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Heidelberg will occupy Hall 1 as usual, but this time will share it with several other related suppliers. They include its Chinese outsourcing partner Masterwork Machinery, cutting specialist Polar, papermaker Stora Enso, humidification specialist Draabe, and Swiss UV varnishing machinery manufacturer Steinemann.
Also making a splash at drupa is Landa, which will double its 2012 presence to 3000sqm with the launch of its Nano press. Fuji Xerox, Canon, Ricoh and Konica Minolta will also have significant stands.
Once a primarily offset show, drupa is now focusing on growing the trends of tomorrow in print, packaging production, multichannel communications, 3D printing, functional printing and green printing.
Messe Dusseldorf chief executive Werner Dornscheidt says: “Print is repositioning and so is drupa. Digitalisation, personalisation of print, and cross media integration are major developing themes and drupa will reflect this.”
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