Transcript 2016 WPCF Japanese Printing Industry Status (Seoul, Korea)

Japan Federation of Printing Industries
Current status Japanese printing industry
JAGAT(Japan Association of Graphic Arts Technology) has conducted their member
survey in 2015 and the results are as follows.
・Sales volume decreased 0.1% to indicate some sluggishness comparing with past 3years
recovery. Operating margin was 1.6% which is 2 years continued negative trend. But this is
partly due to more active investment activities.
・Commercial and publication printing sector are facing decline, especially for publication
printing which has been continuously decreasing for 13 years.
Package and specialty printing sectors are showing increase for 4 years. Active
investment in this sector caused lower operating margin. Package printing sector is seeing
more competition due to new entrants in this sector.
Business form sector is showing 3 consecutive years of increase in sales and also
showing better operating margin than other sectors. This is due to the needs to adapt to
digital printing and digital shift of market requirements in early stage and they were able to
adapt to such shift in the market earlier.
・When comparing business result according to company size, smallest segment ( below
19 employees) is showing highest profit margin and this is due to their unique technologies
or due to capturing unique market. The largest segment (over 300 employees) is also
showing stable result. Company in between (30-49 employees and 50-99 employees) are
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in difficult position and showing the lowest profit margin.
Japan Federation of Printing Industries
Current status Japanese printing industry (2)
・Capital-to-asset ratio is now over 40% and stability of companies are increasing. Due
to government support for investment, aging equipments due to deferred investment,
plus proliferation new technology like LED-UV drove more active investment. The main
interest is not increasing capacity but improve efficiencies to lower operating cost.
・Average age of employee is 42.0 years in past 3 years. In past 10 years, the average
age increased 2.1 years but this continued aging seems to be stabilized.
(Average age of Japan is 46.1 vs India 27, Brazil 30.7, China 36.7, USA 37.6, UK 40.4)
・The average number of employee for this survey was 137 employees, average sales
amount of a company was Yen 3.2B($32M).
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Japan Federation of Printing Industries
Promotion of VOC warning device
VOC warning device has been jointly developed by JFPI and New Cosmos Electric Co.,
Ltd. The device, model XH-981G, is designed to provide warning if VOC level exceeds
preset standard using unique hot wire type semiconductor sensor.
Since October 2014, the prototype of XH-981G was installed in several printing companies
with offset presses and went through field testing. With the result and feedback from the
field testing, XH-981G has been improved and commercial released since January 2016.
The features of the XH-981G are:
・With unique hot wire type semiconductor sensor, it can monitor VOC accurately.
・Once VOC level exceeds preset criteria, it will warn with buzzer and flash light.
・Small all-in-one design make it easy to install any place.
・Product life is 2 years and once its usage exceeds 2 years, it will notify to urge
replacement by flash light.
The device was exhibited in IGAS2015 at the booth of Komori, Sakurai,
Miyakoshi , Ryobi MHI and JFPI.
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Japan Federation of Printing Industries
eBook trend in Japan
Finally eBook is showing certain momentum for continued growth. Some of main drivers
for the growth are:
1. Monthly subscription for e-magazine is now getting popularity. Especially “d-magazine”
provided by NTT Docomo is attracting 2.5M subscribers as of Dec 2015. The
subscription is Yen400(Approx $4.00) per month which let you to read 160 titles of
magazines.
2. Broader acceptance for “e-comic” including free version to attract more audiences.
Line Manga 10M, comico 10M, Mangabox 9M, Shonen Jump+ 4.5M subscribers
3. More active attitude for publishers to issue eBook version simultaneously with book.
Unit: $M
eMagazine
eBook
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