In this Part Two of my drupa preview series, I will be focusing on some—and I emphasize the word “some”—of the digital press announcements visitors to drupa will see. I was not able to attend all of the briefings, so my apologies in advance to suppliers that are not covered here … and not all supplies are predisclosing what they will be showing. WhatTheyThink will be providing additional and balanced coverage in the continued run-up to, and during, drupa. This article summarizes my perspective on what is happening in the digital press arena based on the briefings I have been able to attend in this fast-paced run-up to drupa. Also be sure to review David Zwang’s multi-part series on inkjet; and Andy Tribute’s More of What to See at drupa, which also covers offset presses.

B2 sheetfed digital presses—both inkjet and toner—are one of the big stories for drupa 2012.

As Andy Tribute pointed out, the Fujifilm Jet Press 720 and the Screen Truepress JetSX are two sheetfed inkjet presses that are already in the market and were previewed at drupa 2008. The Memjet-based Delphax elan will be shown this year and available sometime next year as my recent interview with Delphax outlined. The big story with Delphax is the price point. We will be interested in seeing the quality of the output at drupa, and also in more fully understanding the cost of the consumables. Delphax has priced the engine at about a third the cost of its competitors to date, but it is still important to look at the overall cost picture, which David Zwang has done in his technical review and to which we plan to add more detail as it becomes available. As Tribute also pointed out, MGI will also be showing its 52 cm Alphajet and he speculates about an inkjet announcement from Komori, which in fact will be shown at drupa (see below). It is very likely there will be more, and it will be interesting to see how these play out in the commercial print market.