Production Inkjet Market Survey of Ink Estimating Solutions

Inkjet Insight recently completed a survey of production inkjet owners on their use of ink estimating tools. The goals of the survey were twofold; first, to understand customers’ access to and usage of ink estimating tools and second, to measure satisfaction with their ink estimating processes options. Responses were limited to those that had production inkjet installed and estimating software available to them. Data received from respondents with inkjet and without estimating software in use were excluded and retained for further analysis.
We first queried participants about the types of work performed on their inkjet presses. We then moved on to their access to, and usage of, ink estimating tools as well as their perceived difficulty. Participants were also asked about their ink estimating practices as well as the strengths and weaknesses they find with ink estimators.
Key Findings Include:
  • 79% of respondents considered the ink estimating process to be important or very important to their overall estimating process.
  • 66%  of respondents with an ink estimating tool in use found their software simple to very simple to use.
  • 67% of respondents had access to free ink estimating tools provided by their OEM with the average ease of use for OEM provided estimators being 4.18 out of 5.
  • Third party ink estimators had the highest ease of use rating with 4.40 out of 5.
  • 81% indicated that there were particular types of jobs where ink estimating has helped them compete more effectively.
Responses covered participants who reported working with a wide range of OEMS including Canon, Durst, EFI, Fujifilm, HP, Kodak, Konica Minolta, Kyocera, MCS, Monotech, Ricoh, RISO, Screen, Xerox and others. Many participants had presses from more than one inkjet OEM and some used more than one ink estimating tool.
This report includes recommendations for owners of production inkjet when evaluating ink estimating tools and approaches. Recommendations for OEMs on improving communication with customers and supporting data-driven decision is also provided. It is the perspective of Inkjet Insight, supported by customer research, that there are opportunities for improvement in the current ink estimator market that would benefit customers and print buyers.
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