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Reuters is carrying the story that Canon has announced a $1.1 billion bid for Oce: Canon seeks printer power with $1.1 billion Oce bid | Deals | Reuters The article speculates about a possible counter-offer from HP or Kyocea, but concludes these are not very likely.

In an interview with a German financial paper, KBA’s new CEO says the company is about to start making acquisitions in other industries where it sees more profit potential than in printing presses. At the top of the list are packaging equipment, water treatment equipment, and thermal solar...

If you are interested in VDP programming tools, including the inexpensive kind for small ad-hoc conversions, you should check out the discussion at: The Digital Nirvana � Blog Archive � Programming Languages for VDP It started with a plug for Perl and Ruby as essential tools, then moved on...

KBA ended the first half of 2009 with a loss of over 42 million Euros, but it could have been worse: the company reports an unexpected jump sheet-fed press sales in the second quarter. KBA is still hoping for a break-even year. The full press release is below, and there is some additional...

Heidelberg has confirmed that it now has 1.4 billion Euros in loans and guarantees. The details are in line with the various reports from the German press that I have been passing along in recent weeks. There are three primary sources: A loan of 300 million Euro under the government’s credit...

The German press is reporting that Manroland sales are down 29% for the first half of 2009. The company plans to lay off 1,100 people and it is looking for contract manufacturing projects that it can bring in from other companies. More details are here: Manroland must cope with a severe drop...

KBA, which announced earlier this month that layoffs might be coming, has now apparently told employees at its Trennfeld plant that there will be 400 layoffs among KBA's three web-press plants. I say "apparently" because the German magazine Druck & Media, which posted this news on its website...

KBA's layoffs early this year were in plants that built sheet-fed presses. Many thought web presses would make it through the recession OK, but it isn't working out that way. KBA has now announced that there will be hundreds of layoffs in its web-press plants. More details and a link to the KBA...

The amount of financing Heidelberg is seeking seems to rise with each new report. Bloomberg.com is now reporting a figure of 1.4 billion Euros (about $2 billion). Furthermore, Bloomberg says it has heard Heidelberg will get the money in the next few days. More detail, and a link to the...

Governor Schwarzenegger wants schools to start switching this fall, beginning with math and science materials. "What are California's public school students still forced to lug around antiquated, heavy, expensive textbooks?" he says. Details here: Schwarzenegger wants California to switch to...

It lost a quarter of a million Euros for its 2008/9 fiscal year, and it projects a losing year to come, in spite of all its cost-cutting. The government loan guarantees it applied for still haven't come through, but are expected soon. Details from the end-of-year report, and a link to the...

A recent study by the German consulting company Pier 18 suggests that medium-sized printing companies (100-500 employees) are surviving the best in these difficult times. The report looked at the period between 2004 and 2008, a period when the number of German printing companies decreased by...

It's confirmed: the German government has agreed to provide Heidelberg with loan guarantees that the company had applied for a few weeks ago. The exact amount involved is not yet known, however. Details: Heidelberg will receive financial help from the German government

It recently surfaced in the German media that Heidelberg has applied for half a billion Euros in government loan guarantees. A local official wants to make sure the company gets the loans so that “Heidelberg survives the year.” More details are available here: Heidelberg applies for 500...

Consumables, service, plus maybe digital printing--those are the main new directions for Heidelberg, according to a fascinating interview with Juergen Rautert, Heidelberg's #2 man. A summary of the interview, plus a link to the full text, is here: Heidelberg’s second-in-command discusses the...

A German newspaper says that Oce is cutting 300 jobs (about a fifth of the workforce) in Poing, Germany. Poing is the site where Oce's high-speed roll-fed and sheet-fed machines for the graphic arts and transactional markets are produced. A translation of the article is here: Problems in Poing

Things are looking even grimmer, so Heidelberg is doubling its previously-announced cuts. WhatTheyThink has the press release: Heidelberg Increases Cost-Cutting Measures - Printing Industry News from WhatTheyThink

On March 24 at a New York publishing conference, the co-founder of On Demand Books (maker of the Espresso Book Machine) disclosed a few more details about the company’s plans. Among the highlights: The Espresso machine will be leased (on a click-charge basis), primarily to bookstores...

I admire a lot of things about VistaPrint: its remarkable level of automation, its marketing, its web-site optimization. Those are the main factors that have made it the world's biggest web-to-print service. So, as I was doing research for an article on w2p, I was surprised to find that...

Manroland's preliminary figures indicate that the company managed a small profit for 2008. Manroland did as well as could be hoped last year, but thinks 2009 will be very tough. Details here: Manroland wraps up 2008 with a small profit