According to a new report published on 18th of October by the global intelligence specialist Market Intel Reports, the international coding and marking market is expected to grow on an annual average of 7%, to reach 7 billion USD by 2021. Among this market, the segment of inkjet coders will experience positive growth of 6.6% on average, says another report, published this month by Credence Research.
Reports explain that trade globalisation is one of the main factors behind this growth as it implies “increased product traceability requirements for vendors”. This is especially true in the food and beverage and the pharmaceutical industries where products have to be marked with more and more traceability data to protect from counterfeit and to respond to consumers' pressure for more informational data on the packaging ( eg. Country of origin or allergens).
Other major trends in the evolution of coding and marking industry in the next 5 years is the rising demand for eco-friendly, recyclable inks are consumers and companies want to be more respectful of the environment. The inks will also have to be able to resist to harsh environment condition to increase the durability of the codes. Versatile inks, suitable for both porous and non-porous surfaces will also reveal an asset.
Coding and marking manufacturers will also have to invest in R&D programs to develop innovative and high quality machinery to meet with the rising industry standards in terms of readability and code durability.
Focus on ALE:
- The amount of traceability data will not be a problem anymore thanks to our innovative piezo inkjet printers. With a print band from 0.7 to 576mm from a single controller, you can print on very small packaging (medication for example) or mark lot of security information on your products.
- With A grade on white background and B grade codes on brown cardboard, ALE ensures you to have 100% readable messages with excellent contrast and high resolution for all texts, barcodes or images.
- All ALE inks are REACH approved meaning that they do no harm to workers or the environments. Our oil-based inks are mineral oil free, meaning that they are 100% recyclable.
- Thanks to our range of soft solvent inks (MEK free), ALE printers are capable of marking onto non-porous surfaces. They are highly resistant and can be suitable for outdoor conditions (sun, water, dust, etc.)
- The second reports states that the main challenges for inkjet coders in the future will be the high maintenance and costly consumables. Though this can be true for CIJ printers, ALE systems require very minimal maintenance (once a year) and have exceptional life time: up to 10 years. ALE inkjet printers operate with specific 250 or 600mL ink bottles for longer runtimes with no downtime in production, making them very economical consumables option.