This report examines the Australian Production Digital Print market and attempts to answer the key questions of market size, segmentation and growth. The definition of Production Digital Print devices includes laser and ink jet printers but excludes offset technologies. For the first time, the market has been segmented into heavy, medium and light production devices as well as colour and monochrome. The report is based on a survey of key vendors.

Benefits:

For vendors and service providers to the world-wide digital print market place Australia and New Zealand can provide fertile markets and a gateway to Asia. To help both local and overseas firms considering doing business in the region an independent report was commissioned by PODi Aust NZ to aggregate and segment data on both sales and installs of production digital print devices in the Australian market. The report looks at figures collected from all major device vendors (both mono & colour) and segments them according to defined production parameters based on light, medium and heavy duty cycle rating. This report is must read for anyone interested in knowing where the opportunities are for growth in the Asia/Pacific region.

A first of its kind in the region this report describes the size, segmentation and growth of this important market based on a new survey of equipment vendors. This study provides more up to date information since the interim report published in October 2007. Improvements include the availability of full year 2007 sales data, rather than estimates; the participation of an additional vendor – previous estimated; and a better definition of production devices resulting in the restatement of some information.

A preliminary non-segmented report for Australia and New Zealand were initially compiled and can be obtained by contacting the regional office by emailing info@podi.com.au

Description:

The report examines sales of production digital print devices in Australia to year end 31 December 2006 and 2007. It also collected for the first time in the region aggregate and segmented total installs (light, medium and heavy) of digital production devices in Australia. An estimate is provided of total sites Australia wide capable of handling digital print production is provided as defined. For this study, a Production Digital Print machine was defined as meeting all the following criteria:  

• Sold to a production/document based application (not office, consumer, wide format)
• Print is produced directly and not from a plate (not offset)
• Machine is run by an operator
• If colour, A4 speed is 40+ pages per minute (plus certain models)
• If monochrome, A4 speed is 70+ pages per minute

This report introduces market segment that was not collected in the earlier study (October 2007). The segments were based on the recommended number of equivalent A4 impressions per month. The light segment is for machines rated as < 100,000; the medium segment covers 100,000 to 1,000,000; and the heavy segment is for > 1,000,000. Participants classified their models into the appropriate category.

Information was collected and validated from the following major industry vendors – Canon, Fuji Xerox, Hewlett-Packard, Kodak, Konica Minolta, Océ and Ricoh. The author thanks these companies for their cooperation. To complete the total market, informed estimates were made for other vendors based on industry knowledge.

(PDF - 8 Pages July 2008)