Richard Rasmussen's Market Watch - January 2014

Richard Rasmussen, director of Ascent Partners, punches in with the first installment of his industry market watch for 2014. He kicks off the year with a detailed overview of business sales, acquisitions, mergers and closures, as well the latest equipment sold and installed throughout January.

Market movements.

The year started with the news that Sensis, the producer of printed telephone directories, had sold 70% of its business to Platinum Equity.  The future for these directories is now very much clouded.

Bespoke Laser sold its business to Carbon 8 (NSW) and Melbourne based Printcentre opened a new manufacturing site in Sydney. Kwik Kopy North Sydney announced it has a new owner; he added this one to his stable of four other existing stores.

Perth based CJ King moved its manufacturing centre to its QLD site.

CMYK Hub was again in the news announcing a partnership with Snap Queensland – they have effectively replaced Snap’s Qld hub which closed late last year.  CMYK Hub also announced a new manufacturing site, this time in the Northern Territory.

Wide format printer CIT in QLD fell into the hands of the administrators.

Equipment sales and installations.

There was a wide variety of digital, offset, wide format and flexo presses sold / installed around the region:

Scott Printers (WA) purchased two B1 sized Komori GX/G presses – an eight colour and a six with coater.

Print Media Group (VIC) purchased a Gidue M5 digital flexo press, and House Print and Design (QLD) installed a Ricoh Pro C901 digital colour printer.

To coincide with the opening of their new premises, CMYK Hub (NT) installed a Heidelberg Anicolor and HP Indigo press, and Printcentre (NSW) installed a Fujifilm Onset S40i wide format digital machine.

More details of these installations and market movements can be found on the Market Watch page of our web site, www.ascentpartners.com.au as well as the six print related businesses we have on the market.