From the opening bell with large crowds waiting in the foyer, to the close when crowds had to be pushed out at 4pm on Saturday the show was abuzz with printers. By the end of the exhibition 11,148 visitors had passed through the doors, representing an 7.3 percent increase over PrintEx03 on the previous show four years ago. The only thin time was the evening shift on Thursday, by 7pm PrintEx was virtually deserted, leaving exhibitors to twiddle their thumbs for two hours.
Most of the 180+ exhibitors were well pleased with the show, variously describing it as 'three times better than last time', 'better than Pacprint' and 'marvellous'. Indeed some of the major exhibits will be considering asking the organiser for a four day show next time, as the costs, particularly for the magnificent seven major exhibitors of Heidelberg, Currie, Cyber, Fuji Xerox, Canon, Agfa and HP will not be much greater than three days. However as PrintEx began as a show for smaller suppliers there is sure to be vigorous debate.
The new Forums, which had non-industry commentators Peter FitzSimons and Jenny Brockie leading debates on the future and digitalisation respectively, were similarly successful, with standing room only.
Australian Printer produced the show's only daily newsletter, which was written and printed live each day, with Konica Minolta, Oce and Fuji Xerox each printing a 2,000 run four page issue.
New technology highlights included the Heidelberg Anicolor inking and dampening, the giant HP Scitex TurboJet, the Canon imagePRESS, the Fuji Xerox / Adobe / Typefi / GBC book in an hour, but many stands had new technology solutions on show.
The growing importance of PrintEx was highlighted by HP bringing some 15 journalists from India, Korea, China and Singapore to see the launch of the new DesignJet Z6100, the first time PrintEx has been used for a regional launch, and the first time overseas journalists have been at an Australian print show.
