Saumitra Trivedi (left) and Chandrakant Vishwasrao of Edifice with HP Designjet XL 3600
Mumbai-based Edifice Technologies announced four concrete deals at the Media Expo Mumbai 2022. The company is the distributor of HP Designjet series and Canon digital production printers for the Mumbai market. Edifice also has its own in-house brand, Accucut, under which all finishing equipment is sold.
At the expo, the company sold an HP Designjet XL 3600 large format plotter printer, a Canon imagePRESS C710 color production printer, a Canon imagePRESS C165 color printer and an Accucut cutsheet feeder which is a complete solution for cutting and does half cut, full cut, creasing and perforation.
“The response at the expo has been really very good. We closed four solid deals for four different products. We have got some serious inquiries as well and expect to get more orders in the days ahead. Media Expo Mumbai is taking place after a gap of two years and there is a lot of excitement among the visitors. The print industry is bouncing back as the pandemic recedes,” says Saumitra Trivedi of Edifice Technologies.
Edifice Technologies is optimistic about the future
Trivedi says that the demand for printing is mainly being driven by industries such as packaging and infrastructure. “There is a strong pick up in real estate industry which is giving a boost to CAD products. Signage industry too is seeing strong recovery and there is a robust undercurrent,” he adds.
Trivedi is optimistic about the current financial year and hopes to see a good order book. “Businesses have learned to live with Covid virus. There is some apprehension that the recent uptick in Covid cases may turn into a wave around June or July. Even if that happens I don’t see any impact on the market sentiment as Omicron is a much milder variant. We witnessed in the January Omicron wave that the fatalities were very low. I expect a very good FY2022-2023 for the print industry,” he concludes.
2023 promises an interesting ride for print in India
Indian Printer and Publisher founded in 1979 is the oldest B2B trade publication in the multi-platform and
multi-channel IPPGroup. While the print and packaging industries have been resilient in the past 33 months since the pandemic lockdown of 25 March 2020, the commercial printing and newspaper industries have yet to recover their pre-Covid trajectory.
The fragmented commercial printing industry faces substantial challenges as does the newspaper industry.
While digital short-run printing and the signage industry seem to be recovering a bit faster, ultimately
their growth will also be moderated by the progress of the overall economy. On the other hand book
printing exports are doing well but they too face several supply-chain and logistics challenges.
The price of publication papers including newsprint has been high in the past year while availability is diminished by several mills shutting down their publication paper and newsprint machines in the past four years. Indian paper mills are also exporting many types of paper and have raised prices for Indian printers. To some extent, this has helped in the recovery of the digital printing industry with its on-demand short-run and low-wastage paradigm.
Ultimately digital print and other digital channels will help print grow in a country where we are still far behind in our paper and print consumption and where digital is a leapfrog technology that will only increase the demand for print in the foreseeable future. For instance, there is no alternative to a rise in textbook consumption but this segment will only reach normality in the next financial year beginning on 1 April 2023.
Thus while the new normal is a moving target and many commercial printers look to diversification, we believe that our target audiences may shift and change. Like them, we will also have to adapt with agility to keep up with their business and technical information needs.
Our 2023 media kit is ready, and it is the right time to take stock and reconnect with your potential markets and customers. Print is the glue for the growth of liberal education, new industry, and an emerging economy. We seek your participation in what promises to be an interesting ride.
