Ink-jet: A Disruptive Technology

The cost of offset litho print has fallen by nearly 50 percent over the past decade, partly as a result of productivity improvements. But it still cannot compete with the very short runs of digital printing, or the variability which digital printing provides.

Ink-jet technologies will produce even faster speeds and higher levels of quality at lower cost per page in the coming years. One needs only to plot the changes that have already occurred to see the trend. The applications that were open to the early ink-jet technologies were limited by their quality and cost, but that is changing. New approaches expand the role of ink-jet for transactional printing and direct mail. It lowers the barriers for entry into the growing transpromo market. It will also bring ink-jet into applications that were typically only feasible with offset or flexo or screen printing, such as publications (newspapers and magazines), catalogs and newspaper inserts. These developments will even increase the range of commercial printing applications that may transfer from conventional processes.