Inkless Raises € 1 Million in Funding for Printing Without Cartridges

Inkless, the TU Delft spin off that enables black and white printing without cartridges or toners, has raised a sum of 1 million euro’s in its latest investment round. This investment is made by a group of Angel Investors.

“With this money we can make our technology ‘development-ready’, which means that we can meet the required quality and speed performance requirements so that we can begin with the development of our first product,” said by Arnaud van der Veen Co-founder/CEO of Inkless.

This first inkless printer will be launched in the market of Packaging and Labelling (Coding and Marking for initiates). Arnaud van der Veen: “The printing of barcodes, shelf life data and product codes on packages and on the labels will form the ideal market for us to start in. This is because this market is currently being dominated by black-white printing and also because this market will highly profit from the growth of online retail. More and more packages are being shipped and all of these have to be provided with printed text and barcodes.”

At this moment, Inkless is composing a customer file, such that the product will perfectly fit the needs of the users. “We are looking for innovative-thinking companies that print lots of packages and/or print labels, and that find it important that their company processes are sustainable,” says Van der Veen.

Inkless printing has the advantage that no ink, cartridges or other consumables are needed to print on packages or labels. There is also no need any more for special thermal coatings. Besides the cost savings Inkless also provides strong environmental benefits. Next to that, the printer doesn’t have to be refilled.

Van der Veen: “I always compare this to the transition from the analogue camera to the digital camera. Suddenly people were able to make unlimited photos and it was not needed to replace the films. Likewise, with our printing solutions, refill and replacement of ink and consumables will not be needed.”

The printing technology of Inkless is not only limited to the printing of packages and labels. Van der Veen: “Our first product will fit this market but after that we will make the technology accessible for production printers, office printers, consumer printers and receipt printers. In all these market we can offer the same advantages, a cheaper and more sustainable printer without any hassle with ink, cartridges or toners.”

The current investment amount will serve to reach a competitive printing performance. After this, the product still has to be made. For this reason the preparations for the next financing round, which is planned for the end of 2018, have already started. “This next round will either be financed by strategic partners or Venture Capitalists. The first meetings have already taken place,” says Van der Veen.