The digital revolution is here, reverberating through flexo-prepress trade shops all across North America. A recent Flexographic Technical Assn. survey reports the use of digital plates on the rise. Today, 15.8 percent of converters served by flexo-prepress providers insist on digital technology. Poll participants forecast that within five years' time, 53.2 percent of all plates produced in these operations will be of digital format.

Currently, 93.7 percent of prepress trade shops surveyed make conventional photopolymer plates, and 44 percent make digital photopolymer plates. The majority of plates produced—84.2 percent—are manufactured using conventional, analog technology. Most members of the sample audi-ence said they expected their ratio of digital to conventional plates to change, with the exception of one traditionalist who expressed plans to continue using only conventional plates "to maintain the most flexibility."

On average, the FTA survey respondents predict that the ratio of digital to conventional plate usage will change over the next two years to 31.3 percent digital and 68.7 percent conventional plates. In five years, the projected ratio is forecast at 53.2 percent digital to 46.8 percent conventional.

Poll respondents also cite the most common line screens used today as 120 and 133. Six out of seven trade shops surveyed point to even higher line screens and cite a move toward 200 lpi.

The FTA survey reports annual flexo-press trade shop sales of from $6 million to $1.9 billion worldwide. The average number of jobs run per month is 606. These multi-million dollar operations employ anywhere from as few as eight people to several thousand in multiple locations.

Half of those sampled have experienced intensive competition in the past year. They said that economic uncertainties were driving cost concerns and spawning a number of initiatives designed to maximize efficiency. Reliance on adoption and implementation of measurement tools, particularly FTA's Flexographic Image Reproduction Specifi-cations and Tolerances (FIRST) program, are now commonplace.

The vast majority of prepress providers, who commented on sales trends, report that even in a slow economy, business is on the rise. At least half of those who quoted a number say business is expected to grow 10-20 percent in 2003. Even this year, many claim sales growth will come in at between 10-15 percent.

By market segment, prepress providers say flex-pack converting needs drove 44 percent of all business at the average operation. Tag and label followed in second position and was credited with generating 25 percent of revenue. Folding-carton and corrugated-board business shares each averaged out to 13 percent, with sanitary-product printing accounting for the remaining 5 percent.