Why are the offset press vendors sleeping through the digital revolution?

We put the question in this deliberately provocative form because, in all the discussions of the crisis in the industry, a couple of things stand out:
- Most people are confident that climate change is occurring; and with the same degree of confidence, we can say that offset printing has seen its best days and the future will belong to digital printing.
- The fact that no one can yet say exactly what the timeframe will be, and which vendors and technologies will lead the change, does not affect this conclusion in the least.

Under the circumstances, we can’t be blamed for wondering why in the world Heidelberg, KBA, Komori, et al. don’t seem to be investing in the technology that represents the future of printing. We haven’t heard the slightest hint from them. Why are they leaving it to the Fujis, HPs, Kodaks, and Canons of the world? All of the offset vendors have certainly mastered every aspect of their current printing process. How difficult can it be to move from successful software control of an offset press to developing a purely digital one?

By now, virtually every printing plant has a mixed array of offset (or flexo) and digital printing devices. Digital printing is under consideration as a replacement for offset for more and more products, markets, and applications. Graphic arts dealers, faced with a collapse in investment in CTP, are taking a hard look at the market to identify the digital printing solutions that it makes sense for them to offer.

Step by step, the whole market is gradually shifting over to digital printing. Why, for heaven’s sake, are the offset vendors still failing to invest in their own future? Why are their attempts at financial health focused almost entirely on cutting whatever they can? It is no longer possible for them to argue that embracing digital technology would hurt their existing products – on the contrary! What better outcome could there be for a press vendor than for a customer to invest in digital equipment – and still remain that vendor’s customer?

Honestly, we just don’t understand it. If you look at the effort that Heidelberg has been putting into its plunge into large-format offset, it’s impossible to claim that either the size of the investment or the ROI is an argument against developing digital printing solutions internally. And so we ask again: Why are the offset press vendors sleeping through the digital revolution?  

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