Our monthly B2B magazine Indian Printer and Publisher which began as a technical newsletter in April 1979 enters its 36th year of publication. Earlier this year, the B2B monthly Packaging South Asia entered its 8th year of publication. Our well known IPP Conferences began with a prepress conference in Delhi in 1994 and then went on to become user conferences around the country including Mumbai, Bangalore and Hyderabad. The interactive and sometimes noisy conferences were eventually taken up by IppStar — Ipp Services, Training and Research PL — the conference, training, research and consultancy company initiated in 2001. In 2008, we also took part in the formation of the Independent Media Alliance — an association of print industry B2B publishers in Australia, Europe, India and South Korea.
As we get ready for the next financial year, let’s recount some of the past years’ important events for our group. The IMA inducted its newest member in 2013, The Label Technology Division of Keyin Media based in Beijing China whose Label China Exhibition is in June and which our group will support. In addition, we hope to promote the Indian entries to the Asian Label Awards which will be awarded at a banquet at the Asian Label Summit in China in November 2014.
In mid-2013, IppStar became the Indian affiliate of IDEAlliance — an organization that now promotes global print and media standards and best practices in the United States, Korea, China, Mexico and Europe. A significant
element of this work is that IDEAlliance already has nine eLearning programs for attaining color professional certifications that are acknowledged on its global website. (A tenth eLearning course on Integrated Media Workflow is scheduled to become available in the coming months.
IDEAlliance India already has ten members and was able to support and organize CMP-Print training and certificate programs in Delhi and Mumbai this February (with the help of NPES and Konica Minolta) which altogether trained 51 participants. The Indian trained professionals will be listed on the IDEAlliance website when they pass the online exam and are certified. This will establish the process of benchmarking and recognition of our skilled color professionals as a first step.
It is further planned that by end of the calendar year, IDEAlliance India will be able to organize a three-day hands-on G7 Expert training and certification program in the country. Additionally, we hope that the first couple of Indian printing and packaging plants will qualify as G7 Masters within or near this time frame.
Together with its training and ethical consulting services, IppStar has now emerged as a leading print industry research organization. It is currently researching the country’s book publishing industry and continues to broaden its multi-client studies and execute time-bound subscriber-based projects.
