On-demand printing is in the "window period" Union is more important than monomer

On-demand printing makes the relationship between printing companies and publishing companies “blood thicker than water”.

Look at the market

Trickle down demand

The demand for on-demand printing is rooted in readers, and changes in reader demand have caused fluctuations in the publishing and printing industries. In this process, the publishing industry needs to reduce inventory, and the printing industry needs to transform and upgrade. It is precisely because of the trickle-down demand of the reader market, content providers, and printing companies, that the on-demand printing business eventually converges into an important branch of the printing ocean.

"Publishing companies will use the on-demand publishing model sooner or later, and there will be fewer and fewer long-print books." Robert, CEO of US Global On-Demand Publishing Co., introduced that his company publishes 5,000 books on demand every year, and the entire Europe and the United States There are about 400,000 on-demand books published on the market each year, with an average volume of about 300 copies.

"Now there are many alternative reading methods for traditional books. In the future, the trend of book publishing is that there are more and more types of bibliography published every year, and the period of knowledge update is getting shorter. Readers have more channels to acquire knowledge, which is not bad News. "Kang Pinde, Senior Marketing Manager of Commercial Printing Products Department of Canon (China) Co., Ltd. believes that digital printing optimizes publishing tools, shortens the time to market of books, and helps the publishing industry to reduce cost pressures in a changing market. The market benefits. The data he shared is that digital printing currently occupies 7% of the printing volume in the European and American markets, 10% of the books account for 90% of the printing volume, and 90% of the books are printing less and less. Therefore, accurate prediction of printing volume is becoming more and more important for the publishing industry.

In synchronization with overseas, China's digital printing has maintained a rapid development trend. In 2013, China's digital printing output value reached 10.3 billion yuan, an increase of 63% over the previous year, accounting for more than 1% of the total printing output value for the first time. Xu Shengdi, deputy director of the Printing and Distribution Department of the State Administration of Press, Publication, Radio, Film and Television, said that domestic companies have made positive progress in the development of digital printing, technology application, and path exploration. When Donnali (China) Investment Co., Ltd. built a digital printing production center, Tianjin The joint venture between Evergreen Printing Equipment Co., Ltd. and Taiwan Jianhao Printing Co., Ltd. to promote the cloud printing business has attracted the attention of the industry.

Exploration mode

"Wear new shoes without going the old way"

Digital printing provides opportunities for change and improvement in the industry, and printing is no longer as simple as "buying a machine to take orders". If you wear new shoes and go the old way, you will be waiting for the company to have a "nowhere" sign. In the practice of on-demand printing, Phoenix Publishing and Media Co., Ltd., Hucai Graphic Arts Co., Ltd. and other companies are exploring models suitable for enterprise development.

"In the digital age, the publishing process has changed: the linear production process has become a non-linear production process; paper as a carrier has become a full-media publication; logistics costs have changed in the Internet and mobile Internet environments." Phoenix Publishing Media Co., Ltd. Li Xue, deputy general manager, believes that in the process of market fragmentation and personalization, enterprises need to think about how to complete product production on demand, whether time analysis can be more synchronized, and whether data processing can be more intelligent. "Data model analysis occupies a more important position than the precipitated data. Effective for behavioral data analysis, your big data will become very valuable. The success of House of Cards is because it is a product produced after data analysis. "Li Xue revealed that in the on-demand printing practice, Phoenix Publishing emphasizes Internet thinking and user experience and services. The modification of the second phase of the data management system project is based on the collection and analysis of user data.

Hucai Graphic Arts Co., Ltd. is developing on-demand printing in the mode of nationwide layout of production centers. The company's on-demand printing director Huang Duan said that Hucai has shifted from the packaging industry to serve on-demand printing business, with more emphasis on services. "We mainly serve book on-demand printing and out-of-book publication on demand. Currently, we have established 3 production centers in Beijing, Dongguan and Shaoxing. In the future, we will also establish 3 production centers. Although each production center is personalized Business, but we must implement standardized production and achieve unity in terms of equipment, processes, and paper. "Huang Duan said that Hucai serves publishing customers based on the e-commerce model and hopes to connect with customers through the network system, from the production process to the logistics stage. Can be viewed through the system, so that the traditional manual order is abandoned.

"Printing on demand is changing the book publishing model, but up to now, it is still in the early stages of development," said Wu Zuyi, executive deputy general manager of Beijing Jingshi Printing Co., Ltd. Jingshi Printing has established a digital printing production base in cooperation with Peking University Founder Electronics Co., Ltd. in 2012, and has already made some profits. At the end of this year, it will introduce a full-color printing equipment. In the face of development pressure, Jingshi Printing adopted the method of replacing people with machinery and equipment to minimize the impact of people on printing quality.

View the future

Farewell to the era of unicorn

"According to the current situation of simple price competition, the rapid development of the digital printing business is unsustainable." Wu Zuyi believes that printing companies have no say in the processing industry. Only by making full use of the mobile Internet, cloud platform, and big data technology to expand upwards, printing companies can increase the added value by providing customers with one-stop services from the all-media design business.

"Printing should be self-improving", but it is indispensable for publishing companies to "set the stage to sing operas" together. What new understanding do publishers have for digital printing? Wu Zuyi said that publishers need to discuss the book pricing mechanism again, and the book marketing model and employee performance evaluation should also be adapted to the on-demand publishing business. Li Xue believes that the on-demand printing and wiring system does meet the publishing house's demand for printing, reducing costs. However, the president of the publishing house should not just focus on the printing price, but should pay more attention to the cost changes of inventory and returns. On-demand printing should produce three aspects: lower printing costs, lower publication costs, and optimized publication value.

"Software is more important than hardware, judgment on things is more important than technology, unity is more important than monomer, confidence is more important than performance, and the future is more important than before." Li Xue said that in the window of on-demand printing development, enterprises It is necessary to see the future of the industry from real data, and to have firm confidence in the future. "We can wait, but we must not miss an era."