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 By Kevin Keane, IAPHC CEO Holy E-Mail Batman! Last week, we added more than 50 Craftsmen member e-mail addresses by asking people, and bugging people, and because individual members took the time to canvass their Clubs. While we acknowledge the views of some long time members that e-mail is just a passing fancy, it is clearly evident that more and more members eagerly anticipate receiving Tuesday Morning News. The Harris Poll released last Wednesday found that the percentage of US citizens using computers to access the Internet jumped to 36% up from 28% last June. And the most popular use continues to be e-mail. Kodak Polychrome buys Anitec On February 20th Kodak Polychrome Graphics announced agreement to acquire Horsell Anitec. Anitec is owned by International Paper. Anitec's product line includes litho printing plates, and graphic arts films and papers. It's Electra DC product is a computer to plate solution that is thermally imaged. Kodak Polychrome is a joint venture owned by Eastman-Kodak and Sun Chemical; this acquisition is yet another indication that consolidation continues to sweep through every segment of the graphic arts. Danka Shareholder Suit On February 18th a class action lawsuit was filed against Danka Business Systems PLC, in US District Court in Florida. The suit alleges that Danka and certain of its officers made false and misleading statements about its success in integrating the acquisition by Danka of the Office Imaging and Imaging Services businesses of Kodak. As we reported in a December issue of Tuesday Morning News, the stock market punished Danka by driving down its stock price 59% in one day, although recently the stock price has rebounded somewhat. Interestingly, in the February issue of Larry Hunt's High Speed Copy News (a publication we highly recommend to people involved in the copying segment) Larry surveyed several of his readers about the quality of service since the Danka acquisition, and the comments were generally favorable.What's IT? We found this comment in the January/February 1998 issue of PaperTronix to be worth a rumination: "Owning the network means owning the output." The gentleman quoted is Robert Kraft who owns a multi-million dollar electronic printing business in Milwaukee as well as being the AlphaGraphics franchisee for the state of Wisconsin. We've mentioned this quote about the changing graphic arts industry before: "We have moved from a craft based manufacturing industry to an information based service industry."We've also speculated before, that printers may have greater need to employ an MIS department than a traditional press maintenance department in the future. The digital age means that getting an handle on information technology (getting IT) will require systems expertise (Management of Information Systems or MIS). Systems expertise in handling IT, will allow the successful printers (to be known as information service providers?) of the future to own the network, and thus own the output. Perhaps those that don't get IT, may have had it?Adobe get's a Nod The March issue of Smart Money magazine recommends Adobe Systems. The article, after commenting on the formerly lockstep binding of Adobe to the fortunes of Apple Computer, states: "Adobe's latest earnings report should reassure the doubters. Windows based versions of its software have reached 56% of its revenue, up from almost zero only recently, and sales of these versions are growing at a 49% rate. The transformation came just in time, since the report revealed that Mac-based sales had fallen 19%." How to Screen Mutumbo One of the secret pleasures of our daily duties is to field arcane inquiries and then to actually find solutions hidden somewhere in the farflung corners of Your Knowledge Network. Several times in recent years we've had someone ask us about imprinting an image more than 84 inches in length. Both time it was to create a life sized image of a NBA basketball star. Thus we were pleased to hear from member-at-large Deb Olson of Modernistic in St. Paul, MN that her company has installed the Jetscreen, Direct-to-Screen system, the first in the US. This is a digital screen printing system that transfers the design onto a coated screen mesh without the use of film. The resolution is 600 dpi, and the 48.5" x 117" available printing area make it possible to screen a 9 foot tall basketball player!
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