Kodak sells off its flexo packaging division and its associated Flexcel products to Montagu Private Equity LLP who spin it off as a new company called Miraclon. Kodak also sells its plate factory in Xiamen, China to Lucky HuaGuang Graphics.
The first Landa presses are installed.
In the production inkjet market Screen introduces the Jet520HD+ and Canon improves its ProStream 1000.
Xaar gives up its efforts to develop a range of thin film printheads.
The Karibu is SwissQprint’s first roll-fed large format printer.
Following its botched 2018 attempt to acquire Fujifilm, Xerox attempts a take-over of HP.
Living Coral (Pantone 16-1546) is the color of the year.
These are some important or remarkable events from 2019:
- In Syria the last territory occupied by ISIS is liberated. Fighting does, however, continue.
- Fires destroy most of the 500-year-old Japanese Shuri Castle and a major part of the Notre-Dame Cathedral in Paris.
- July is the hottest month on record globally. Gigatonnes of ice melt in the polar regions. Major wildfires break out in the Brazilian rain forest and Australia.
- In Hong Kong protests and strikes break out over a new anti-extradition bill.
- Travel firm Thomas Cook goes bankrupt.