Printing Outlook 2024: Whither AI?

WhatTheyThink’s annual Printing Outlook report is now available. One of the many topics we cover in this year’s report is so-called “artificial intelligence.” To what extent is it on printers’ radars?

This is the first in a series of articles drawn from WhatTheyThink’s Printing Outlook 2024 report, which is now available. Based on the results of our Printing Industry Business Outlook Survey conducted in Fall 2023, the report includes current and expected business conditions, top business challenges, top business opportunities, and planned investments for 2024. We also look at shops’ interest in adding new specialty graphics areas such as wide-format or textile printing, hiring plans for the next 12 months, and the current state of automation—including what printers are actually referring to when they talk about automation.

We’ll gladly jump on any bandwagon, but with all the talk about so-called artificial intelligence (AI) these days, we thought it worth taking a look at the extent to which print businesses have it on their radars—and are perhaps even implementing it. We dig into this in far more detail in the report, but here are some general findings.

Potential Uses of AI

Last year, Cary Sherburne offered an AI “explainer” article, and in our most recent print edition Joanne Gore looked at AI uses in marketing, so there is no need to delve into definitions here. We can identify potential uses for AI—or, to use a technically more correct term, “machine learning” (ML)—in printing establishments in several categories:

Service and training
Predictive maintenance
Production analytics
Job intake/on-boarding
Scheduling and planning
Estimating
Graphic design/layout/creative services
Prepress automation
MIS/ERP implementation

For each of these, we asked if they:

use it now in their shop
plan to start using it in 2024 or 2025
are considering its use after 2025
won’t ever use it
don’t know

Using Now

As we would expect, use of AI/ML isn’t hugely widespread, but at the moment, graphic design, layout, or other creative work (like writing copy) is the top use for AI/ML: 18% of respondents said they use AI now for creative services. Fifteen percent said they use it for prepress automation while 14% use it for predictive maintenance. In the latter case, this is likely a vendor-based initiative rather than something shops implemented on their own.

Potential AI Use

Our survey respondents were bullish on the potential of AI/ML, specifically for production analytics, estimating, scheduling and planning, and service and training, even if they aren’t currently using AI/ML for these purposes. Indeed, these items topped the “will start using in 2024 or 2025” list while job intake/on-boarding, estimating, and scheduling and planning topped the “considering use after 2025” list.

“Never AI”s

Much to our surprise, few respondents completely ruled out ever using AI. For 13%, they said they’ll never use it for service and training, followed by job intake/on-boarding, estimating, and graphic design/layout, all at 11%. These are probably the same percentages that will never use an MIS, an automated estimating system, and still use paper job tickets.

The one data set that did not come as a surprise was the “don’t know”s:

More to Come

At this stage, no one is quite certain how AI/ML is going to play out in general, least of all in the printing industry (maybe we’ll all be using it to “communicate” with the late Lou Reed). And we’ve actually been down this road before: we saw the same basic thing a decade ago when “cloud computing” was first starting to appear on everyone’s radar (see our most recent “Tales from the Database” for a trip into the WhatTheyThink survey archive). And, lest we forget, the industry spent much of the 1990s thinking the Internet was just “CB radio with typing,” few people foreseeing how completely disruptive it would be to print. So we’re not surprised that so many print businesses don’t know how or even if they will use AI. This is not to say that it won’t be disruptive for certain job categories (like survey report writers…), but once all the buzz dies down, and humanity fails to be eradicated, it will simply be the way print (or any) software works and we won’t think two ways about it.

Our Printing Outlook 2024 report—thus far still written by humans (make of that what you will)—is now available for download! The brand-new report provides detailed analysis of the latest WhatTheyThink Printing Industry Survey, the latest industry economic data and macroeconomic trends, as well as industry and cultural technological trends to look out for in 2024 and beyond. Purchase it now!