Improvements in toner technologies are leading to new opportunities

Ink World, August, 2007 by Sean Milmo

The impressive growth of inkjet printing could be slowed by laser printing, which some commentators have predicted would eventually be overwhelmed in the digital printing market by its highly versatile liquid ink-based rival.

Inkjet has relatively quickly become the dominant force in the small office and home (SOHO) sector of digital printing. As a result, it has been able to enjoy much of the growth in demand stemming from the arrival of digital photography.

It has also been making inroads into laser stronghold of copier or electrophotographic printing in shared networks and in-house printing facilities in large offices. In some niches, inkjet has proved itself to be far more successful than laser in expanding digital printing into the commercial printing market, mainly by penetrating the lower end of the sheetfed sector and some packaging segments.

However, recent major technological improvements in electrophotographic equipment and particularly its toners are helping laser printing not only hold its own in key sectors but to take away sales from inkjet in others. It is even opening up opportunities for creating its own niches.

"Even though inkjet has been expanding at a double-digit rate in digital color printing, electrophotographic color printing is growing at around 15-25 percent a year," said Christophe Bulliard, industry marketing manager for digital printing and photography at Ciba Specialty Chemicals.

"Electrophotography has, on the other hand, started from a much lower base in color printing, whereas inkjet color printing has been around for a much longer time," he added.

The technological advances in electrophotography have enabled laser printing to benefit from the volume growth in in-house and large office printing.

"The number of pages printed by the installed base of our machines grew by more than 25 percent last year," said Ben van Assche, CEO of Punch Graphix, whose core Xeikon business is a leader in Europe's sector for high-end, digital color printing systems, software and consumables.

At the same time, new technologies are helping laser printing gain a bigger foothold in the market for product identification, where inkjet has also been in the ascendancy.

The technological innovations in laser printing have stemmed from higher investment in R&D by equipment manufacturers. For example, Punch Graphix has allocated 10 percent of its revenue to R&D.

Over the last few years, there have been a steady flow of launches of better performing electrophotographic presses and other laser equipment by leading operators like Punch Graphix, Oce, Fuji Xerox, Hewlett Packard, Canon and Konica Minolta.

Most of the presses have faster speeds, are more productive and, significantly, have lower capital costs and are less expensive to run. As a result they can print more pages per minute, possibly as much as 50 percent more. Costs per printed page are falling by as much as two-thirds.

Among the biggest changes has been a much higher quality of color reproduction as a result of new technological advances in the production and structure of toners, many of which are developed and produced by the equipment manufacturers themselves.

Traditionally, toners are made by mixing the ingredients--binder, pigments and additives--liquefying and then solidifying them into solid strands which are pulverized into small particles. Now systems have been developed as alternatives to pulverization so that the size and shape of the toner particles can be more carefully controlled. More importantly, smaller particles can be produced which when properly dispersed could provide enhanced color reproduction.

Xerox Research Center has developed a chemical approach for the economical production of smaller toner particles. It enables toner particles to be made under controlled conditions so that they have the right size, shape and structure. As a result, sharper images can be printed with as much as 40 percent less toner.

Konica Minolta synthesizes in an aqueous solution resin particles with a diameter of approximately 100 nanometers. These are then chemically coagulated and fused with color pigments and additives to create toner particles of a uniform size of nearly 3 microns in diameter.

With the help of a similar particle-shaping technology. Xeikon has introduced a polyester-based toner which provides more vivid colors with the potential for a broader range of applications. Punch Graphix develops and manufactures toners at its own state-of-the-art plant at Westerlo, Belgium.

With a capability to provide high quality colors within a broad gamut, electrophotography is able to profit much more from the strong demand for digital color printing, from which inkjet has so far got most of the benefits.

"Digital color printing was the fastest growing of all printing technologies (last year) with a wider range of printers adopting new applications," said Mr. Van Assche. "In addition, ongoing trends such as the increasing use of color printing and a widening use of personalization in printed media have contributed to the growth."