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OFFSET TECHNOLOGY OUTLOOK—Offset and Digital Mashups Put Printing in a New Groove

With a hybridized approach, two printing processes can be better than one printing process—even if the processes are fundamentally different from each other. Patrick Henry explains. 

Monday, October 13, 2025

In 2001, Walter d’Heureuse and Helmut Kipphan of Heidelberger Druckmaschinen AG published a visionary paper in which they surveyed what had been accomplished up to then by combining conventional and non-impact (i.e., digital) production technologies in hybridized printing systems.

The hybrid approach, they wrote, “can create efficient and powerful production possibilities and systems such as in-line imprinting, personalization and coating (print finishing).”

Combination of various printing technologies to set up hybrid printing systems. (Image courtesy “Print Technologies and Design Concepts for Hybrid Printing Systems,” Walter d’Heureuse and Helmut Kipphan.


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About Patrick Henry

Patrick Henry is a journalist and an educator who has covered the graphic communications industry since 1984. The author of many hundreds of articles on business trends and technological developments in graphic communications, he has been published in most of the leading trade media in the field. He also has taught graphic communications as an adjunct lecturer for New York University and New York City College of Technology. The holder of numerous awards for industry service and education, Henry is currently the managing director of Liberty or Death Communications, a content consultancy.

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