Kodak, Sun Chemical Announce Price Increases

ROCHESTER, NY—Kodak’s Graphic Communications Group will increase the worldwide prices of its digital and conventional plates as of May 1. The company cited the “sustained, universal rise” in costs for key raw materials and utilities used in the production of offset plates in announcing the new rates.

Increases for digital plates will be in the range of 5 to 10 percent, while the increase for conventional plates will be between 15 and 20 percent.

Customers and dealers will receive details of the new pricing structure. All current contractual commitments will be honored.

During a conference call with Printing Impressions, company officials also noted the decline in conventional plate usage among U.S. printers has altered the economies of scale for that product segment, which contributed to the larger percentage price increase compared to digital plates.

Additionally, Parsippany, NJ-based Sun Chemical will raise prices on April 1 in North America for the following products:

• 4 percent for SunLit Diamond, SunLit Intense and SunLit Exact sheetfed process color inks;

• 8 percent for all other sheetfed process color inks;

• 7 percent for all energy curable (EC) commercial printing inks;

• 7 percent for all EC narrow web, tag and label printing inks; and

• 7 percent for all EC packaging printing inks.

In announcing the increases, Sun Chemical pointed to the global supply challenges associated with graphic arts raw materials, higher demand from developing regions, consolidation and capacity curtailment taken by the chemical industry, as well as the significant decline in refinery margins over the past two years.

The company says further consolidation in the supply base is expected in 2011 along with continued pressure for suppliers to alternatively sell key raw materials into other markets.