More than 19,000 visitors from 62 countries, with international visitors making up 30 per cent, visited Pack Print International 2019.

The atmosphere was heady with excitement at Pack Printing International 2019

These numbers are far from the organiser board’s expectations for the 7th edition of Pack Print International held at BITEC, Bangkok, Thailand last month. The top five visitor markets registered from abroad were India, Singapore, Malaysia, China, and Vietnam.

“Vietnam is an emerging market in Southeast Asia which has huge potential and strongly focuses on printing. So it’s easy to understand why Vietnam is among the top five visitor markets,” Sabine Geldermann, director of drupa & Global Head Print Technologies, Messe Düsseldorf GmbH, told VIR.

Similar upward trend were seen on the exhibitors’ front, where an almost 10 per cent increase in participation was recorded. This brought to the bustling show floor future-ready innovations and solutions by 325 companies and brands from 30 countries, including some of the best local players as well as national pavilions from Germany, China, Thailand, Singapore, and Taiwan.

“Many of the latest print applications were displayed at PPI. Offset still has a significant position in the industry. On the other side, digital printing is also increasing,” Sabine said.

This year there were numerous first-time product launches by global brands at the exhibition. First up was the worldwide launch of the offset press Speedmaster CX 75 by Heidelberg and Masterwork.

A German-made machine for commercial, label, and packaging printing packed with optimisations in the feeder, delivery, and colour configuration, the multi-talent press was sold by day two of the exhibition along with all the machines that were on show at Heidelberg’s booth.

Next was Canon’s Southeast Asia premiere of its Océ Colorado 1650, a 64-inch production graphics printer featuring two innovations in the form of new flexible ink and Océ FLX finish technology. Three units were sold by the end of the first day of the exhibition, with many more potentials in the pipeline.

In enhancing the capabilities of its print technology, HP opted to present its end-to-end web-to-print solutions at the exhibition. Some of these highlights included the debut of the HP Indigo 7000 sheet-fed digital offset colour press to the Thai market and the inaugural HP Digital Print Pavilion featuring real-life customer testimonials, case studies, and the diverse applications of HP’s Indigo technology.

This optimistic sentiment and economic confidence in the domestic and regional markets was also echoed by Gernot Ringling, managing director of Messe Düsseldorf Asia, “Sales and business promotion activities remain at the heart of a trade exhibition and we are delighted that many successful business dealings and collaborations were formed right on the spot at Pack Print International 2019.”

Proving its relevance and appeal as the region’s premier sourcing event for machine distributors, packaging and printing service providers, licensing manufacturers, and finished goods producers, the exhibition also received growing interest from international visiting delegations from the Korea Packaging Association, Myanmar Paper & Pulp Association, Myanmar Printers and Publishers Association, and several others from Japan, the Philippines, Sri Lanka, and Vietnam, as well as more than 40 local printing and packaging visiting groups from leading FMCG companies.