Xaar Opens Indian Inkjet Printhead Sales Opration

Xaar has taken the next step in its global expansion with the opening of an Indian office - the first by an industrial inkjet printhead manufacturer on the Indian subcontinent.

Xaar has taken the next step in its global expansion with the opening of an Indian office - the first by an industrial inkjet printhead manufacturer on the Indian subcontinent.

Located in Gurgaon, on the outskirts of New Delhi, the new office was opened by Xaar chief executive officer, Ian Dinwoodie, together with Keith Butler, the head of Xaars sales for Asia and newly appointed general manager for Xaar in India, Tarun Kumar Dinwoodie commented: "The Indian subcontinent presents an immense opportunity for inkjet technology and we believe it will be a very exciting market in the next phase of the inkjet industry's global development.

The opening of our new Indian office represents what Xaar sees as a vibrant future for inkjet in the region.

There are nearly a quarter of a million conventional printing presses in India, 70 per cent of which are operated by small family owned businesses.

These small and medium-sized enterprises are also purchasers of both wide format and other forms of digital printers.

With the value of output in the printing industry in India exceeding US$6 billion and the specialist graphics, billboards, packaging sectors a combined value of output of US$2.3 billion, it is clear there is a tremendous amount of potential." He added that Xaar was the first industrial printhead supplier to have a permanent presence in China when it opened its Hong Kong office in 2001.

Chinese operations have since expanded, with an office in Shanghai.

Xaar sees a number of similarities in the Indian inkjet market to that of China just a few years ago.

Like China, India has a rapidly growing economy and is an emerging market for the print sector in general and inkjet technology in particular.

And although it is hard to quantify the market size for digital printing as it is developing so rapidly, Dinwoodie believes the long-term future for inkjet in India is a strong one.

A number of Xaar's current customers are already exporting wide format printers into the region and there is also a significant growth in local demand for Xaar-based products from a growing range of domestic inkjet innovators especially for wide format and coding and marking printers optimised specifically for the regional market.

Dinwoodie said the new office would enable Xaar to work closely with its growing customer base in the region to substantially reduce their time to market develop high-quality products in the process.

"As a high value component supplier, our success is related to the success of our customers and the quality of their products.

Industrial printheads are not 'plug-and-play' products and integrators and manufacturers need to be able to call on support immediately and in their own language and time zone.

It has always been Xaar's belief that the most effective way to win and maintain a large proportion of the emerging printhead market, such as that in India, would only be achieved by working in close partnership with local manufacturers.

In this sense, our local partners benefit from not only having someone on the ground to deal with on a day to day basis, but also all the support Xaar's international manufacturing, service and R and D network can offer." He added that one of the key drivers of Xaar's growth in India would be the speed of awareness and demand for digital printing in sectors such as external advertising, packaging and textiles.

The company believes it is currently the leading supplier of industrial printheads worldwide and its market share is especially dominant in key markets such as solvent based wide format printing.

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