Page 16 - Print21 March-April 2020

People in print
On meeting a
master of printing
Success in printing can be measured in many ways – by craft, technical
skill, sales performance, and business acumen. Any way you cut it, Michael Hannan is the consummate industry professional. Arguably the most influential figure in the sector, he chairs Ovato, the largest printing enterprise in the region, a fitting prominence for someone who’s spent a lifetime working in the industry. As he masters the task of integrating his family-owned IPMG with publicly listed PMP, he talks with Patrick Howard about the past two tough years and the innovative possibilities of a future in printing.
It’s telling that Ben Shipley sits in on my interview with Michael Hannan in the light and airy offices of Ovato in Pyrmont, Sydney. The chief
innovation officer of Ovato is not your traditional printing industry apparatchik; he’s not there to
check that the chairman stays on marketing message while speaking with the media. Rather, he’s the face of the future, not only of Ovato, the largest print company in Australia and New Zealand, but also of the printing industry in general as it enters a new decade in a world of multi-media communications where data is as essential as paper and ink.
It would be easy to devote the entire interview – a rare event in any case – to Michael Hannan’s colourful and chequered history in printing, but the man himself makes it plain that’s not what’s on his mind.
“I want to talk about the future of Ovato, about what’s possible, about how we’ve integrated the two businesses, about how we’re able
to deliver more value to our clients through better data and give them a bigger bang for their buck. I don’t want this to be about the past. I’d rather sacrifice my story in order to get across some of the key messages for the new Ovato,” he says.
Over the past two years Hannan and Ovato have been focused on implementing the largest merger ever seen in the printing industry. Bringing the two companies, IPMG and PMP, together, integrating
their production sites, technologies and cultures, and launching a new identity proved to be a gruelling task for both management and workforce. Closing two printing plants –
including the iconic Moorebank facility – laying off staff, getting rid of seven presses while installing the latest heatset manroland Lithoman, has taken its toll. Hannan refers
to it as a trial to be undergone in order to achieve the efficiencies that underpin the whole idea of merging. He admits it took longer and proved more difficult than first planned.
“It’s been painful, it’s come at a significant cost to our people and operations and it cost us more money than we expected. It hasn’t exactly won a lot of support among shareholders and investors, but we had to do it. This type of work would be best done in a private company. Then none of the dirty linen of what must happen to close a print site and strip costs out needs to be aired. I hate that part of it.”
Good hard look
“You have to take a good hard look
at your business, particularly when you’ve gone through a merger like we have. You don’t just look at duplicated print sites, or duplicated presses,
but back offices and services. You realise there’re far too many people in all these places. You can’t sit there and do nothing about it; you have to take those costs out. It’s a hard and painful process, but it has to be done.
“The track we’ve gone down the past two years is to lower our cost of production, so we don’t have to talk to clients about increased prices.
We must achieve our margins by lowering the cost of manufacturing. That’s the way the printing industry has to work going forward.”
Ovato’s business is based mainly on catalogue and magazine printing. Before the merger, both companies came off the back of robust print
Most print businesses
are family concerns... why?
“Families generally can take a longer-term view
of the industry and, without the public company exposure, can develop their businesses with
less scrutiny from their competitors and other stakeholders. Having said that, IPMG as a private company was always run with public company levels of governance. Perhaps with not so much of the bureaucracy that can stop a public company from being as nimble. Print requires flexibility and agility. We are working towards more of that at Ovato.”
16 Print21 MARCH/APRIL 2020