By Editor Morten B. Reitoft

Canon today announced their new VarioPrint iX-series printers. I haven't seen the machine(s) in action, so what you are about to read is based on the press release sent today. 

I could choose to copy/paste the content of the press release, do a few changes to it, and then sign it with my name, indicating that it was my work. This is, however, not our style, and I believe that you, dear reader deserves more and hopefully better.

Print Customers should love this!

If you are considering investing in inkjet-technology, I suggest that you start looking at the machine from a customer-perspective. Customers are rarely interested in what technology you offer, as long as you deliver high quality, on time, and competitive—looking at the specs of the new iX devices they for sure have some exciting promises. The important thing is, of course, whether the iX-series printer can complement, extend or replace current technology, so you seamlessly can deliver the products you are expected to. The iX-series offer production on a wide range of substrates ranging from 60g to 350g depending on whether the substrate is coated or uncoated. According to Canon, the iX-series is capable of printing on 'commodity papers', meaning that there is no need for pre-treated paper. This is important for both printers and customers since there is a tendency that pre-treated paper has a surface that differs slightly from the regular paper. It's also crucial since pre-treated paper often is more expensive and with fewer options.

Last but not least, this is VERY important if your customers have design-manuals requiring specific substrates. The reason why the iX-series, like the previous i-series, is capable of print on commodity paper is due to a technology called ColorGrip. More about ColorGrip later.

Customers will also love the iX-series since the new inks offer better print-quality with what I would expect, reaching a larger gamut.

Management should love the iX-series

For many printing companies, it's crucial to choose the right technical solutions since the investments are vast, but also because the depreciation and repayment time are strong competitive KPI's in today's printing environment. The iX-series most likely doesn't come cheap, so therefore even more reasons to look into what solutions fits you the best. However, all printers in the market today are great devices (depending on applications), but Canon has an extremely high reputation for being a good partner. When we talk to printers both in Europe and in the US, Canon and HP are the two companies rated the highest.

Having a good partnership is sometimes even more important than the product itself. Not that it isn't important, but uptime, service, and understanding of your business are truly important factors. In this interview from PRINTING United, we spoke with Perry Fernandes from PCI Group, who said that Canon (at least in the US) is more like a partner (vs being a supplier).

Canon's iX-series is based on Kyocera print-heads known for being high quality and reliable. With a device scaled to print between 1 and 10 million impressions a month, these measures are important, but maybe even more important from a management perspective is the lower operational cost. 

The press release doesn't say anything about acquisition cost and operational cost, but this is assumed to be important parameters for printers investing in the iX-series.

Production should love the iX-series

Productions are always looking for reliable printers - downtimes cost money. The iX-series deliver an uptime of more than 90%. In the US-Press Material, the uptime is rated to 94%. I don't know if this has been an issue with previous Canon models or something that is a general issue in the industry since this is not rated on competitors models? However, the uptime is, of course, something that is utmost important. As already mentioned the iX-series is built on the i300 printer launched at drupa 2016. The footprint is relatively large for a B3 printer, but one of the reasons for this is the ColorGrip that I promised to describe more. ColorGrip is Canon's built-in paper pre-treatment solution. When you have an ink that hits a paper, you can easily imagine that the drop spreads with the fibres in the paper, before it dries. To avoid this, you either purchase pre-treated paper or your treat the paper as part of the printing process. This issue is well-known with all inkjet solutions in the market, and today most deliver in-machine solutions or use other technologies (like the Landa) to achieve similar effect.

Canon is using a technology they refer to as iQuarius, which first use hot air to vaporize the excess water from the ink, and then in the second step again uses heat to fix the ink. The ink is water-based with pigments of polymer.

The iX-series is fast. With 320 impressions, a minute, the hourly page count is 19.200 A4 simplex pages 4+0. The max format is B3 (350 mm x 508 mm.)

Is it possible to conclude?

No - with every printer delivered to the market, it takes time to evaluate whether a printer is a success. According to Canon, they have installed more than 250 i-series printers - which sounds a bit higher than what I've heard from other sources. In general, the role-out of inkjet seems to have taken a longer time than anticipated. At the Hunkeler Innovationdays 2019, CEO Michel Hunkeler spoke about this but was also very optimistic since quality and speed is on par now. Canon has, however, delivered both roll-based and sheet-based inkjet machines longer than most, so you can be pretty sure to see Canon as a front-runner for many years to come, and therefore also a good option for your investment. 

This article is based purely on speculations, considerations based on interviews I have done during the past years, as well as information obtained from Canon's website. The original press-release has been attached for reference.