Page 42 - Print21 Nov-Dec 2020

Year in Review
Print 2020 in review
The weirdest and hardest year in modern history started off with wild bushfires followed by devasting floods, and that was all before Covid smashed through the economy and our lives. Print21 takes us through the year of all years as it unfolded in print.
March
Large format printer Easy Signs moving up
Sydney signage and large-format printer Easy Signs moved into a larger factory, tripling its floorspace, just a few years after its previous massive upgrade.
Controversial Skope into admin
Controversial signage outfit Skope and its various associated entities went into administration, just six months after it managed to transform a $2.3m debt in a closely related manufacturing arm into a favourable DOCA, leaving rivals fuming.
The Virus
The coronavirus Covid–19 lit up the headlines. Suppliers rushed to assure printers that ink and consumables lines would be maintained. Print work began to plummet, and
subsequent lockdowns saw some sectors stop completely. As fears swept the world, causing cancellations of major events, giant German trade show drupa said it was all systems go for June. Two weeks later drupa postponed to next April.
HP: Entire Indigo range revamped
HP said drupa will see the “most exciting launches in the history of Indigo” announcing a raft of new print solutions with eight new presses that include a 6000sph B2 press, an entry level SRA3, and software for its new range of label and packaging presses that will enable them to hit any spot colour within three minutes.
Big govt assistance for small business
The federal government unveiled a raft of packages created to help small and medium sized business – which includes the vast majority of printers – carry on working through the coronavirus scare.
Ex-Waratah duo resign from Finsbury
Two former Waratah Group execs caught up in a front-page World Vision print contract exposé, Stephen Kernahan and Brett Chalmers, resigned from their roles at Finsbury Green. According to
an investigation by The Age and Sydney Morning Herald the duo were aware of, and in Chalmers case signed off on, payments of $3000 a month to a World Vision printing advisor – the father of an exec there – and saw the $2.5m print contract for the charity awarded to Waratah Group as a result.
Xerox pauses hostile HP takeover bid
Xerox put its hostile takeover bid for HP on ice, citing the need to focus on the coronavirus, and saying it had nothing to do with the plummeting stock prices of both companies. Activist shareholder (corporate raider) Carl Icahn was behind the move.
January-February
Imagination flooded
The huge floods that swept through Sydney wiped out the Imagination Graphics printroom, rendering all its print systems – including the new sheetfed B2 inkjet digital KM-1 Accuriopress – out of action.
Intelligent Speedmasters
Heidelberg launched a new generation of Speedmaster presses, which it called ‘the most intelligent and most automated’ to date.
Eco vandals target bus shelter posters
An artists’ collective was vandalising JC Decaux bus shelter printed posters across the east coast capital cities, pulling them out and replacing them with their own climate- change posters.
Pettaras sale sparks wide move
High profile print identity Theo Pettaras sold his Digitalpress business to marcomm services outfit Bridgestone Investments in a strategic move, which will also see it enter wide format production.
Avon Graphics buys Protectaprint
Avon Graphics bought the assets and business of troubled laminating
outfit Protectaprint, which went into administration at the back end of last year.
42 Print21 NOVEMBER/DECEMBER 2020
AusPost CEO issues warning on letters
National mail monopoly Australia Post group revenue for first half of 2020 was up four per cent year-on-year, but letters revenue plunged again, down by nine per cent, with CEO Christine Holgate warning “the time has come to transform these services”.
drupa to run textile factory
The blurring of print boundaries is highlighted as drupa plans to runs its first digital textile print factory at the show
ACCC okays $1.72bn sale of Orora Fibre
The Australian Competition and Consumer Commission approved Orora’s sale of its Australasian fibre business to Nippon Paper subsidiary Australian Paper.