Konica Minolta Graphic Imaging U.S.A.

BY MARK SMITH Technology Editor It’s been more than a decade since the first high-volume, modern digital color printing systems were introduced. Heidelberg and Presstek teamed up to launch the digital offset (GTO DI, in this case) product category in 1991. A few years later, the Indigo EPrint and Agfa/Xeikon Chromapress ushered in the era of the all-digital production color printing systems. In the future, though, 2004 may be looked back upon as a key transition period in the maturation of digital printing as a business segment—both on the vendor and user side. No fundamentally new technologies were unveiled, but all the vendors

BY MARK SMITH Technology Editor Among the more notable, prepress-related developments at Graph Expo and Converting Expo 2004 were several things that didn't happen. It was a simple matter of timing that kept Presstek Inc. from having anything new to report regarding its bid to acquire the business and assets of the A.B.Dick Co., according to Ed Marino, president and CEO. A.B.Dick's future continued to be in the hands of the Bankruptcy Court since it had filed for Chapter 11 protection. Marino still expected a favorable decision to be rendered by the end of October, since no other formal bids had been entered as