Last month I wrote about Canon’s two new printheads, and the upcoming label and two packaging presses that are in development, which were largely based around conversations that I had at this summer’s Drupa show with various people. I also talked with Peter Wolff, chief marketing officer for Canon Production Printing, who was keen to tie all the different elements together, which is worth coming back to with a separate story. So this article is a summary of that conversation.
Canon initially entered the commercial print market through its office copier business, with these machines evolving into Multi-Function Devices. At the same time, Canon also scaled up its BubbleJet thermal inkjet technology from home printers to also include wide format photo-printers such as the current ImagePrograf series. From this position, Canon then bought its way into production printing by acquiring the European company Océ back in 2010, which also came with a solid range of wide format printers.
However, it does seem to me that Canon has often struggled to tame Océ. Although the Océ business has operations worldwide, it’s operated as part of Canon, meaning that here in Europe this unit appears to be part of Canon Europe, which itself is a subsidiary of the Japanese headquarters, Canon Inc. But Océ, now known as Canon Production Printing or CPP, still remains a remarkably tight-knit group of people. This separation between Canon Inc and CPP was very obvious at Drupa 2016, when journalists realised that the new printers had different colour branding and design to separate products from Canon Inc and CPP.
Fortunately there was no sign of this sort of differentiation at this year’s Drupa though many of the staff I talked with still made a clear distinction between Canon Inc, meaning Tokyo, and CPP, the former Océ business based in Venlo (the Netherlands) with a manufacturing plant in Poing (Germany). Not surprisingly, Peter Wolff started by denying that there was any split within Canon.
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Canon’s dual
printhead
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Instead, he argued that Canon has benefited from its acquisition of Océ, pointing out that Canon Production Printing, with the backing of Canon Inc has pioneered a number of new market segments. He explains, “With the ColorStream we drove the market around transactional printing. With the VarioPrint i300 we opened a new product segment because before we launched that there was no inkjet cut sheet segment in high volume. We have defined a new product market combination. So when we look at the webfed ProStream, that was the first and best product to bring offset quality and media range to water-based inkjet.”
In 2020 Canon introduced a new sheetfed press, the VarioPrint iX3200. Wolff explains the background behind this, “We saw that the i300 did not bring us to the capability that we wanted. It should have been the sheetfed brother to the ProStream. We felt that we would need to redesign the system which we did and that gave us offset quality and media range in sheetfed.”
Indeed, Canon has been remarkably successful with the iX3200, selling over 600 units worldwide. It now also forms the basis of Canon’s partnership with Heidelberg, where it will be rebadged and sold as the Jetfire 50. As such it will be Heidelberg’s main B3 offering, validating Wolff’s claim to offset quality.
Wolff argues that Canon’s success comes from having developed its own technology behind the various sub-systems that make up a modern digital press. He acknowledges that Océ’s first step into inkjet was the Jetpress which was an OEM product from Miyakoshi but says that this was matched with Océ software technology. Wolff continued, “We then started working on paper transport design. And our paper transport with the vacuum and belt is different to what other manufacturers are doing.” He added, “And then with the ProStream we started our own ink development, tracking that over a long time.”
He points out that the Japanese arm, Canon Inc, is also developing new products using its proprietary thermal ink technology that will help Canon increase its overall market share. So far this has led to the LS2000 LabelStream label printer and the iX1700 sheetfed printer, which I’ve previously written about, along with a new thermal printhead, which I’ve already covered.
Canon VarioPrint iX1700is a sheetfed press using thermal printheads Photo Nessan ClearyMeanwhile, I’ve already written about CPP’s new printers, including the B2 sheetfed press, the VarioPrint iV700, its folding carton variant and a new Corrugated Print concept, which are all underpinned by a new Si-MEMs piezo printhead.
Wolff says, “The new printhead is driven by CPP but supported by Canon Inc – we have expertise in both countries. There is a deep understanding in CPP gained over 20 years, with our learning around using piezo heads from Kyocera with the wave forms, and our capability to develop our own inks and couple them with the right media. And we have a very strong experience in developing thermal heads in Canon for the Image Prograf.”
Wolff notes, “So we go step-by-step into new business areas. And this is how we bring innovation to the market, to offer customers new opportunities that have not been there before. And with the iV700 now we can go to an existing segment and bring capabilities which are right now not available from other vendors, like the performance of the system, and the B2 paper size and the overall productivity we have around this. And this seems to be the role of the CPP within the Canon group.”
However, Wolff stresses that CPP is not operating on its own but with the backing of Canon Inc, adding, “I think it’s an advantage that CPP also had the freedom to go where we thought was the right way with the right technology. And that also includes for dry toner.”
Wolff went on to point out the strategic value of this, “I think that a company like Canon should have the financial power to become more and more the owner of the technology it uses.” He continued, “I see that there are two groups of companies. One are system integrators and the other are technology owners. And both today are bringing good products to the market. But I can imagine that with some further consolidation it will be a struggle to control all aspects of technology, and that includes having a good relationship to customers and understanding their requirements and being able to react quickly to market needs.”
Labels and packaging
Naturally, we also discussed Canon’s push into the packaging market. Wolff told me, “Label printing is a first step. It was our ambition to have a relatively fast market entrance with an existing product that we just needed to slightly adapt to our needs.”
That led to Canon’s first inkjet label press, the LS4000, which was based on the existing FFEI Graphium. However, Canon found that it needed to make a number of improvements to the quality, application range and serviceability. He continues, “And we have customers today who are satisfied with what we have delivered. But the innovation comes now from Canon Inc, which has made the first steps to enter the market and we have the first foot in the door.”
The Graphium was itself based on the chassis of a flexo press from the British company Edale, which Canon went on to buy in 2022. Wolff says, “The acquisition of Edale was not to add flexo technology to our portfolio. It was to have an entrance into the packaging and label industry. We have a customer base that is different to what we do today and gives us some advantage, because Edale is serving small and large customers in the industry.
“And Edale has a very agile approach to development. Between Edale R&D and our team around the sheetfed products in Venlo, there is a collaboration that aims to have Edale components in our folding carton solutions.”
Canon split its Drupa stand into different applications Photo Nessan ClearyAt Drupa Canon showed a new inkjet label press, the LS2000, which uses Canon’s thermal inkjet technology and was developed in Tokyo. Wolff says that Edale was not involved in the development of this press, explaining, “The development in Canon Inc was already too advanced to need help from Edale.”
Instead, Canon appears to be using Edale’s expertise for the new packaging presses, which I’ve previously covered. Wolff notes, “I think our portfolio is pretty complete. And it gives us the confidence to develop into packaging.”
He points out that this move into packaging is part of a long term ambition, saying: “These printers we see now are the result of management decisions that were taken five years ago. And these are the base technologies that we needed in order to develop the folding carton and corrugated machines to a level that we are happy to introduce them to Drupa. And we are technically about another 24 months until we can ship the first product to the market for carton and corrugated.”
He says that Canon still has further steps to develop on its roadmap, such as more colours, and ensuring that the inks can be certified for indirect food compliance. He notes, “Designing a product is one thing. But bringing it to the market and creating brand recognition is another thing. People will want to see how serious we are in this industry. And we are aware that customers want to see what our ambitions are and that’s why we have shown these concepts two years ahead.”
Other markets
Given that Canon is keen to open up new market segments, I asked about the potential for other markets such as textile printing. Wolff replied, “We have looked at textile but have decided so far to focus our investment in other areas of the market.”
Equally, Canon has previously dipped its toes into 3D printing. Wolff says, “It’s an area that we have on our radar but so far we have always found opportunities where we had a stronger chance of getting high investment return.”
He adds, “But for other markets it’s not always about having the technology or the foot in the door. We are aiming to be number one or at least number three in the segments we are in because this allows us to get the return on investment in order to keep on investing in all areas of the industry.”
Wolff concludes, “The success of Canon is a combination of technical competence, the ability to develop products and having market and customer access and being able to offer maintenance to customers over a period of ten years or longer. And this is where we are really strong. And this is what we consider when we go into new segments and new markets.”
From my perspective, it has been quite interesting watching Canon over the years assembling the different building blocks, from the substrate transport, the ink, primer and drying, and now the printheads. It still seems to me that there are two separate R&D centres, in Canon Inc and CPP, but this may well turn out to be a strength rather than a problem. Indeed, my conversations this year with Darren Pickford, sales director of Edale, and more recently with Peter Wolff of CPP suggest that Canon Inc is more at ease now with simply helping its European acquisitions to get on with their jobs.
You can find further details on Canon’s range of production printers from canon-europe.com.
First published by the Printing and Manufacturing Journal on 10 October 2024. Reproduced by permission. www.nessancleary.com
