Transition to Digital Printing Roils the Book Industry
The print management business (aka purchase aggregation and/or print outsourcing) was active in July. Innerworkings announced the acquisition of EyeLevel, a company which produces retail displays and fixtures in the Czech Republic. This follows the company’s acquisition last month of a packaging design and sourcing company in the UK. Another player in the print management space, Pitney Bowes, is bowing out of the business, selling its PB Management Services unit to Apollo Global Management. Apollo is the huge investment firm that proclaims its expertise to be contrarian, value-oriented investing, with significant distressed expertise. The print management business is changing—are these transactions signals that the overcapacity in the offset printing business might be lessening, possibly mitigating the advantages that endemic overcapacity afforded the print management firms? More on this topic to come in August!
Mark Hahn is a managing director and founder of Graphic Arts Advisors, a boutique strategic financial advisory and consulting firm focused exclusively on the printing, packaging, mailing, marketing services, brand management, and related graphic communications industries. With more than 35 years of graphic communications experience in the areas of finance, operations, sales, M&A, and general management, Hahn has served as chief financial officer, chief operating officer and other senior positions with several commercial printing companies, as well as founding and eventually selling his own printing company.The firm assists company owners and management, as well as their lenders, investors and shareholders in the following areas: mergers and acquisitions, sale of business, strategic and financial advisory, capital structure and funding, financial analysis, interim and turnaround C-level management, business valuations and serving as consulting experts. Hahn is the author of The Target Report and is regularly published and quoted in printing industry trade and management journals. Mark Hahn can be reached at (973) 588-7399 or mark@graphicartsadvisors.com
