Digital Book Printing in North America: Market Analysis & Forecast (2015-2020) 

Charlottesville, VA - INTERQUEST, a leading market and technology research and consulting firm serving the digital printing and publishing industry, has released a comprehensive new study of digital book printing in North America. The report complements and extends previous INTERQUEST studies of the role of digital printing in the book publishing market. 

According to Gilles Biscos, President of INTERQUEST, "Digital book printing is playing an increasingly important role in book manufacturing for North American publishers in all sectors of the market. Publishers are keen to cut costs in a generally flat market, and digital printing offers numerous ways for them to do that. Book printers have aggressively adopted the technology in order to help their customers better manage the supply chain, as well as tap new sources of revenue such as Long Tail sales of back list titles."

The study is based on 40 in-depth telephone surveys with leading book printers in North America who collectively produce over 1.5 billion books per year; in-depth interviews with 20 large and medium size publishers; an Internet survey of 80 production and manufacturing managers from book publishing firms in the U.S. and Canada; input from interviews with printing equipment, finishing, and paper vendors; and findings from other research and work related to digital production printing recently conducted by INTERQUEST. 

The study assesses the overall book market in North America as well as the use of digital printing for producing books, including adoption, applications, and challenges; key players; streamlining of the supply chain; the growth of POD; the evolution of color digital printing; the migration from toner to inkjet imaging; book customization and personalization; distribute-and-print opportunities; and the evolution of run lengths. In addition to detailed survey findings the study includes market size forecasts from 2015 to 2020.

"The book market is in better shape than a few years ago, eBook growth has tapered, and printed book volume has increased for two years running." said Biscos. "At the same time, we have yet to see robust adoption of digital printing by major trade publishers; digital book printing with inkjet, which has grown enormously, is still by large in the hands of large printers; and although print runs continue to decline, much of the addressable market is still beyond the capabilities of digital equipment. We continue to forecast healthy growth for digital volume in the book market, but a number of factors we detail in the report will need to fall into place in the coming years."

Digital Book Printing in North America: Market Analysis & Forecast (2015-2020) is immediately available. Hard copy or PDF licensing of the 300+-page report, which includes more than 200 exhibits illustrating and highlighting key findings of the research, can be ordered by contacting INTERQUEST at 434-979-9945, or through the company's website www.inter-quest.com/reports.php. A companion report, Digital Book Printing in Europe: Market Analysis & Forecast (2015-2020) is also available.