As you know, the 13th edition of the exhibition, will be hosted from 4-8 February 2017 at the India Expo Centre, Greater Noida. The Expo Centre has constructed six new pillar-less exhibition halls with a height of 13 metres, equipped with ultra-modern facilities, for holding national and international events at a much higher scale. The load bearing capacity of the new halls is around 30 tons/per sq/metres, which meets the requirements of PrintPack 2017.

The Prime Minister’s ‘Make in India’ is the message at PrintPack 2017. Indian manufacturers like TechNova, Lineomatic, Manugraph, TPH, Autoprint, Welbound, etc are targeting the Indian domestic market that is ready to spend.

In addition, all these companies are making in India for the world plus the neighbouring nations. Our country has a large domestic market which is ready to spend. Printers around the world know what Indians are capable of creating. We are reliable and much more cost effective than the Chinese. At PrintPack 2017, our industry should focus on boosting domestic demand and create a unified market with a view to reduce transactions costs.

Nothing is impossible.

I strongly feel, Indian players must target China, North Africa and even more aggressively countries like Bangladesh and Sri Lanka and the East African Continent.

The newspaper industry is seeing a pick up. At Manugraph we are happy that Malayala Manorama has confirmed investment for 13 towers of the Smartline 4x1 double width press for multiple centres across Kerala. Established in 1888, Malayala Manorama is one of world’s largest daily newspapers which registers a readership of 99.12 lakh with a print circulation exceeding 2.3 million copies. It is published from 18 printing centres: 11 centres in Kerala, five centres in Indian cities outside Kerala, and two located outside of India.

This epitomises the growth in the non English regional newspapers in India. As you know there are more than 82,000 newspapers in publication. In 2015, India’s newspaper industry grew by 8%. Even today print publications account are equal to 43% of all corporate advertising.

The most important trend is, the growth in India is being driven by regional newspaper with runs of 30,000 to 40,000. According to the Indian Readership survey results, the top three newspapers are Dainik Jagran, Bhaskar Group and Amar Ujala, all three Hindi newspapers, who would gross 45 million readers between the three of them. It is not a small achievement.

Packaging is a solid double digit high growth segment.

Which is why, Manugraph announced a CI Flexo agreement that was inked recently. This deal is between Manugraph India and Carraro & Carint of Italy to manufacture CI Flexo machines in India at Manugraph’s facility in Kolhapur. This makes it a first in the flexible packaging industry in India, as these machines will now be made locally available with Manugraph.

Just look at the packaged food market. It is clocking a compounded annual growth rate (CAGR) of 16%, and is expected to have crossed the USD 51.5 million mark in 2015.

The share of packaged food in the processed food market is expected to increase marginally to around 29% in 2016 from around 28% in 2015. This means the value of food and beverage packaging market in India is estimated to have risen to around $16 billion in 2015 from $12 billion in 2010.

In terms of share, metallic and other packaging material accounts for about half of India's overall food and beverages packaging market, followed by printed cartons and rigid packaging (24%), and flexible packaging material (24%) that includes like food packaging laminates and packaging foils.

Once again, I reiterate that India is the only country where one can find all types of print technologies being manufactured. From pre-press to press to post-press. And PrintPack 2017 is the only exhibition to showcase the Make in India story.

You better be present. All of us need great ideas. Ideas for projects, new investments, product names, print applications, people to hire, etc.

Over the past decades I’ve been intrigued by how great ideas are formed as opposed to mediocre, bland, ignore-able ideas. I believe a print show like PrintPack 2017 is the most fertile field to sow your print crop. You get to meet the machines and the men and minds behind the machines.

Be there. From 4-8 February 2017 at the India Expo Centre, Greater Noida.

A ten second guide to PrintPack 2017

Provin Technos	Press, consumables
Insight Communication & Print Solution India	Pre-press, press, post-press, service and softwares, consumables, packaging, etc
Line O Matic Graphic Industries	Paper converting machinery
Intimate Machines (Welbound)	Diploma 473X – automatic folding machine
Manugraph India	In-Press (a show with the management and sales teams available for customer interactions
Technova Imaging Systems	Digital printing solutions, software and workflows,  offset printing plates, printing chemicals, offset blankets, flexo and letterpress solutions, digital print media, screen and dye sub printing solutions, value added services
Fujifilm India	Digital print equipment, inks
Monotech Systems	Offset, digital print enhancement and finishing, wide format, textile, inkjet, labels & packaging engineering, 3D printing
Manroland India	Web presses, digital finishing solutions & label printing machines
Bobst India	Post-press