Digital Digest: EFI Hits Grand Slam With 2015 Connect Users' Conference

LAS VEGAS—It's hard to improve on a winning formula, but EFI continued to raise the bar for its Connect users' conference as illustrated by the 15th annual event held last month. Approximately 1,500 attendees—about 1,000 of them EFI customers from 25 different countries (a 20 percent increase from the previous year)—gathered here at The Wynn Las Vegas for four days filled with more than 200 educational and breakout sessions, as well as several keynote presentations and networking opportunities for attendees.

Technical training sessions focused on EFI's product range encompassing MIS/ERP workflows; Web-to-print; e-commerce; digital front end print management; and wide-format, label and ceramic inkjet production printing.

Marc Olin, EFI COO and interim CFO, welcomed the large crowd and introduced Gabriel (Gaby) Matsliach, new EFI senior vice president and general manager of its Productivity Software business. Matsliach previewed the EFI Productivity Suite (EPS), an evolutionary shift in the company's productivity software offerings strategy.

With the initial phase of the rollout starting this quarter, the suite will address customers' most pressing automation and efficiency needs by moving the workflow emphasis away from individual EFI software packages and modules to complete offerings that employ best-of-suite, end-to-end workflows. Removing the need for painful integrations of various MIS, Web-to-print, fulfillment and cross-media modules and upgrades, each version of the suite will be certified and tested across EFI's entire portfolio of software offerings for easier customer deployment.

It will simplify and maximize MIS software upgrades, add-on modules and third-party integrations for EFI enterprise (Monarch and Radius), midmarket (Pace) and smaller (PrintSmith) users. Instead of point-to-point offerings, the holistic strategy will focus on providing EFI clients of all business sizes with documented and certified, end-to-end solutions. This will include centralized portfolio product management, synchronized suite releases and rapid deployment capabilities.

Users will "get revolutionary results through an evolution—helping you to gradually get there at your own pace," Matsliach explained to the conference attendees.

Other new product announcements at Connect included:

• Unified workflow management capabilities for combined offset and digital production operations using new Heidelberg Prinect/EFI Fiery digital front-end integration.
• A module featuring EFI DirectSmile technology to enable automated, template-based and data-driven variable image and document rendering within EFI's Digital StoreFront Web-to-print and e-commerce interface.
• An enhanced automation workflow, powered by AccuZIP, which uses Digital StoreFront's Web-to-print capabilities and its new variable data printing module to automate direct mail production tasks.

Guy Gecht, EFI CEO, also welcomed the audience in his opening keynote, noting that 2015 marks some important milestones for him personally. It is the 10th anniversary of EFI's acquisition of VUTEk, his 20th anniversary working at EFI and also the year he will turn 50.

Gecht also noted EFI's goal to reach the $1 billion sales mark in 2016. (EFI senior execs appeared in a humorous, parody video tied in with that milestone, which was posted on YouTube. View it on page 46 using the Layar app.)

One of the Connect conference highlights is Gecht's "fireside chats" with leading executives in the graphic arts and related industries. This year was no exception, especially with EFI's ability to secure RR Donnelley (RRD) President and CEO Thomas Quinlan III, who normally does not participate or speak at printing industry events.

Fireside chat topics discussed during the interview ranged from RRD's omnichannel, client retention and M&A strategies, to Quinlan's views on 3D printing, the role of Big Data and, ultimately, the overall future for print. Quinlan cited examples such as the enduring appeal of physical books in the face of e-books, and the fact retailer JC Penney has decided to produce printed catalogs again five years after ditching the medium entirely to help drive sales and Website traffic.

"Printing's death has been greatly exaggerated. It's not print or digital—it's print and digital. Print is core to a communications plan," he said.

Quinlan also hinted that, due to today's manufacturing and printing automation capabilities, Donnelley could also become a player in the textile marketplace.

The following morning, Gecht's fireside chat featured Avi Reichental, president and CEO of 3D Systems.

Besides all of the educational breakout sessions, EFI Connect also hosted a solutions center, which showcased a complete portfolio of EFI workflow and digital print production software. Attendees saw an exhibit of LED wide-format inkjet technology with 3.2-meter, roll-to-roll and 2-meter, 7-picoLiter UltraDrop hybrid roll/flatbed EFI VUTEk printers, along with an entry-level, 1.6-meter production printer.

3M Commercial Graphics exhibited a Tesla wrapped in graphics produced using a co-developed EFI and 3M ink.

EFI Connect 2015 also featured numerous exhibits from partner companies, including the conference's platinum sponsor, Xerox; gold sponsors, Canon and Kodak; and bronze sponsors, 3M Commercial Graphics, AccuZIP, BCC Software, Esko, ESP/SurgeX, Honle UV America, Heytex Corp., Konica Minolta, MBM Corp., the Print and Graphics Scholarship Foundation (PGSF), Ricoh Production Print and Zünd. PI