Digital book manufacturing forum expands to renowned publishing venue

Charlottesville, VA & Frankfurt, Germany - INTERQUEST, a leading market and technology research and consulting firm serving the digital printing and publishing industry, today announced its first Frankfurt Digital Book Printing Forum. The event will be held Friday, October 14, 2011 at the annual Frankfurt Book Fair. http://inter-quest.com/2011FrankfurtForum.htm

According to Gilles Biscos, President of INTERQUEST, "We've been very encouraged by the success of our Digital Book Printing Forums in New York, London, Paris, Toronto, and Montreal. Germany is one of the largest book markets in Europe, and the Frankfurt Book Fair is a world-renowned event for the book and media industry, so we are very pleased to partner with the Book Fair and include the forum in the Frankfurt Academy." The Frankfurt Academy is a new umbrella brand that brings together the best international conferences, seminars, and publishers' trips that the Book Fair has to offer year round.

The Digital Book Printing Forum is designed around recent INTERQUEST research into digital book manufacturing. Leading book printers and publishers, suppliers, influencers, and other major players of the book supply chain share their experiences, present their latest developments, discuss key topics and challenges, and provide their visions of the future.

According to Holger Volland, Vice President Conferences & Creative Industries Frankfurt Book Fair, "The Fair is focused on the future of the publishing industry and is dedicated to helping publishing and media professionals facilitate and navigate that future as new technologies and business models emerge. Digital book manufacturing is an important and valuable tool that is helping reshape book manufacturing and distribution so we welcome the addition of this Forum to the Frankfurt Academy."

In the morning session the Forum's keynote address will be followed by a presentation from INTERQUEST featuring updates and key results from recent research into digital book manufacturing. A panel of leading book printers will be on hand to discuss their experiences with digital printing and their views of the market.

The afternoon portion of the program features a panel of executives from leading printing systems vendors to discuss issues key to the growth of digital book manufacturing. This will be followed by a special session focused on binding and finishing, substrates, inks, and workflow developments and challenges. Key players in book publishing will then discuss the use of digital printing to help manage their printed book supply chains, as well as publishing trends and challenges.

"Inkjet printing is unquestionably one of the most significant recent developments in the book printing market," according to Biscos. "But attendees will hear not only about digital printing technologies, but about the entire manufacturing process. A great deal of exciting and important innovation is occurring in all stages of the manufacturing process, from printing to finishing. Hand in hand with these technological advancements, publishers are rethinking and retooling their manufacturing and distribution strategies for printed books, in large part because of the wide-ranging changes being wrought by eBooks and online retailers. The views of leading publishers will thus be an important part of the program."

The Frankfurt Digital Book Printing Forum is sponsored by the leading players in the market, including Cabot, Kodak, Mondi, Magnum Digital Solutions, Müller Martini, Océ, Rotolito Lombarda, Screen, UPM and Xerox.