Episode 5 - The Digital Decor Revolution
Recorded live at the Century Club in London.
Host Royce Dodds of Cruse Technologies is joined by Marc Graindourze of Agfa, Robert Bierfreund of Metiqon, and Harald Jordan of IPAC for a conversation on how far digital decorative printing has come over the last decade, and where it still needs to go.
The panel opened by looking back ten years, when the industry was operating as a set of disconnected "digital islands," each supplier focused on its own piece of the puzzle rather than the workflow as a whole. They discussed how that's changed, with Harald making the case that analog thinking is still one of the biggest risks to a digital project's success, and Robert describing the shift towards genuine collaboration across the value chain, from color management to software to quality control. The conversation also tackled a common misconception head-on: whether you need analog printing experience to succeed in digital. The panel's answer was a clear no, though they agreed that unlearning old habits can matter more than any technical skill.
From there the discussion turned to AI, with the panel debating its potential to remove the need for deep specialist design knowledge, while also warning that artificial intelligence without natural intelligence and good underlying data isn't worth much. They also covered the industry's demographic challenge, the true cost of ink per square metre versus price per litre, and why digital growth in decor printing has been a steady, continuous evolution rather than one single tipping point. The episode closes with each panellist offering their own "lighthouse," the one piece of guidance they'd give anyone deciding whether to make the move to digital.
PodFEST is a series of panel conversations recorded live over two days in London, made to give FuturePrint's channels a steady flow of thought leadership content through the autumn. A new episode goes up each weekday.
Watch the full series: https://www.futureprint.tech/podfest-videos
Find out more about PodFEST: https://www.futureprint.tech/podfest-2026-1
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