Sun Chemical’s Sustainable Ink Trio at FESPA 2025
During FESPA Global Print Expo 2025 (6–9 May, Messe Berlin), I spent some non-stop days weaving through eight halls and more than 550 exhibitors. One of the busier booths belonged to Sun Chemical, whose airy layout drew a steady stream of printers, converters and OEM partners.
Amid the buzz I caught a few minutes with Simon Daplyn, Product Marketing Manager, to hear what the 200-year-old ink specialist is rolling out next. Sun Chemical, introduced three sustainable digital-ink lines::
Sun Chemical’s first introduction, Xennia Sapphire™ pigment inks, is available in low-, medium- and high-viscosity versions matched to Epson, Kyocera and Ricoh textile printheads. Because the colour particles are bound to the fabric with dry heat only, the process removes the wash-off stage, saving water, energy and wastewater treatment cost without sacrificing colour strength or hand-feel.
Second, Streamline Toccata™ aqueous inks target blue-back poster papers. Developed for high-volume outdoor advertising, the formulation delivers quick-drying, high-vibrancy prints that resist cracking and scuffing during post-process handling. The ink is also suitable for printing corrugated board for point of purchase displays.
Completing the trio, a room-temperature UV ink set for Epson i3200 printheads relies on ultra-low viscosity and LED curing to eliminate the additional need to heat the ink common to UV fluids in wide-format systems cutting overall power consumption and widening the scope of applications possible.
Going forward, Sun Chemical is looking to leverage ink manufacturing facilities in China, the United States and Europe, a production model that will cut weeks off delivery schedules and avoid thousands of shipping-container kilometres per order. ‘Printers keep telling us they can’t afford long lead-times,’ Simon told me. ‘If we produce or stock locally, they get ink when they need it—and we all cut freight emissions. By mirroring production across three continents and focusing on chemistries that use less water and less power, we will be taking cost, carbon and complexity out of the equation.’
Tighter water-use regulations in textile hubs such as Turkey and Pakistan are also accelerating the shift to pigment printing, making Xennia Sapphire a timely solution.
Sun Chemical will now focus on scaling Xennia Sapphire through roll-to-roll OEM partnerships, running pre-campaign pilots of Streamline Toccata with leading poster printers and commercialising the no-heat UV set in direct-to-film and graphics workflows, all while completing the three-continent production mirror for priority lines by Q2 2026.
About Sun Chemical
Sun Chemical, a DIC Group company, is a global leader in printing inks, coatings, pigments and advanced materials. The firm employs more than 22,000 people across the Americas, EMEA and Asia-Pacific and is committed to achieving carbon-neutral operations by 2050.