Association of Label Printers & Suppliers organized a seminar on “Going Digital – When & How” on 24 th November at India Habitat Centrem, Delhi. The main theme of the seminar was to have an open discussion on d igital printing & finishing technology, discuss issues of moving towards digital printing and share latest invention, ideas & views of Industry Experts. The event was co-sponsored by HP, VINSAK & the FIG group and witnessed a record turnout of printers, converters and media dignitaries from Delhi/NCR.
The seminar was commenced by opening speech of Guru Raj Ballarwad, President – ALPS who gave a warm welcome to all the visitors and have shared his views on how ALPS will be going to support the entire printing industry by starting magazines, organizing seminars and exhibitions, conferences, and so on. The Event was moderated by Ashish Gupta, MD of Rational Business Corporation, New Delhi.
Gaurav Roy – FIG Group ha d given a presentation on how printers can enter Digital printing business, tackle the entry barriers and discussed various benefits of digital and inkjet printing.. He shared a very interesting journey of an Indian Convertor from the late 1990’s to today and also talk ed about the role Mark Andy is playing in offering affordable digital and hybrid solutions to the India market.
Shamim Alam – Hewlett Packard (HP) gave a presentation on how printers can generate unique labels in Digital printing at optimized costing. He ha s also shared how big brands such as Coca-Cola or Oreo biscuits are using digital printing technology to crea te unique labels.
Ranesh Bajaj – VINSAK India Pvt. Ltd had given a presentation on short-run inline converting & embellishments. He had shared his opinions on how to optimize digital finishing costs and save on turnaround time on short to medium run jobs. He gave emphasis on variable data personalization on wads, lottery tickets, scratch cards, etc. saying going digital could mean by start ing as small as adding a variable data printing head to the existing presses, finishing lines etc.
The presentations were followed by an open and an imated panel discussion where leading convertors like Sanjiv Sondi of Zircon, Harish Gupta of Sai Com Codes, S Prabhakar of Ikon Labels, Girender Kumar of Shree Ram Vertitech, all brought out their points of view in terms of the entry level barriers of the high cost of Industrial Digital equipment, high cost of running of digital vs conventional as well as the reluctance of the brands to pay the premium for Digital etc. The vendors tried to offer solutions and advise on these but a key thread to come out of the discussion was that unless both the convertors as well as the equipment suppliers join forces and work towards educating the brand owners and the packaging development teams of corporates, digital was going to be a hard sell.
A generous vote of thanks was proposed and delivered by Ajay Aggarwal of Syndicate Labels who is also, VP – ALPS. He lauded the efforts of the entire ALPS team including Arunesh Bansal, the Secretary of ALPS and the Executive Team in organising this interactive and informative evening. He also confirmed that subsequent events in the West and South of India are planned in the very near future.
