On June 14, PrintAction magazine is hosting a 1-day conference and exposition in Burnaby, British Columbia, designed to provide technological and strategic insight to printers on the West Coast. To register for PrintForum West, which is free to attend, and for more details visit PrintForum.ca.
The conference currently includes four educational sessions, including a kick-off panel discussion with some of Canadian printing’s emerging leaders, including Nikos Kallas, President, MET Fine Printers; Richard Kouwenhoven, President, Hemlock Printers; and James Rowley, Vice President, Glenmore Custom Print + Packaging.
The hour-long session, moderated by PrintAction Editor, Jon Robinson, will focus on how this next generation of business leaders views the future of the printing industry in terms of technology, strategy and innovation.
Session two features Neva Murtha and Catherine Stewart, Senior Campaigners Partnering with Printers of Vancouver-based Canopy, who have more than 20 years combined experience developing visionary procurement policies for printers and publishers, including TC Transcontinental, RR Donnelley, EarthColor and Hemlock. Their session will provide real-world examples of printers working with some of North America’s largest printing consumers through modern procurement practices.
They will provide attendees with new findings from The Blueline Ranking 2017 report to be released this June, which analyzes and ranks the environmental progress driving some of North America’s top performing printers. Stewart will highlight how policies have lead to innovative conservation solutions in partnership with forest and paper companies, creating a more certain supply. Murtha will also provide an update on the manufacture and future of straw paper and other agricultural residue paper initiatives.
The afternoon sessions will provide a more technical overview of the progress of printing, including three technology leaders. First, Kodak’s William Li and Patrick Kerr, both based out of Kodak’s Vancouver facility, which is heavily focused on developing the parent company’s software products, will jointly present a forward-looking technical session aimed at improving printing company profitability. Li, who has been a software engineer with Kodak since 1997 (including Creo), will focus on the impact of colour technologies in relation to how printers can find and then maintain new business. Kerr, who has focused on workflow solutions with Kodak since 2003, will focus on how printing companies can leverage cloud computing and what it means for the business of print.
The fourth session of the day, titled The Smart Print Shop, will be presented by Heidelberg’s Andy Rae, who in April was appointed as Global Head of Marketing for the printing technology giant. Rae will discuss Industry 4.0 in printing, including the concept of The Smart Print Shop, which relates to leveraging print and media workflows to facilitate the complete automation of production processes. Rae will also discuss Heidelberg’s Push to Stop operating philosophy for print manufacturing, which provides a new way for thinking about automation and efficiency, productivity and most importantly profitability.
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