HAROLD CODY is editorial director ofPulp & Paper Magazine

PROS AND CONS OF SUPPLIER CONSOLIDATION

The rapid consolidation of paper industry supplier companies will change the options mills have to buy everything from chemicals to paper machines. P&P provides a review of mergers and delves into the pros and cons of fewer, but bigger suppliers.

MACHINE CLOTHING

Q&A for papermachine clothing suppliers, provided by mill personnel, asks questions about how to pick the right felt, measure wet end drainage performance, guage fabric design parameters such as CFM, and about new coatings and materials available.

UPDATE ON CLUSTER RULES

The water side of the Cluster rules has received a lot of attention, mainly focusing on bleaching. A review of the air side will provide an update on the impact of these regulations on mill operations.

 

Paper and Steve Jobs?

Recently I attended the big Seybold Conference and exhibition, a sort of mega-event for those involved in desktop publishing, e-media, and all of its related facets. Steve Jobs of Apple Computer gave the keynote address. I originally went because I was curious about the developments in electronic information dissemination, electronic books, and new digital printing technology. Another key reason was to look at new products hitting the market that allow publishers, like Pulp & Paper, to protect products they put on the Internet. Technology used to encrypt files limiting usage, a key issue for publishers in protecting copyrights while taking advantage of the web, was one development being highlighted.

PAPER IN A DIGITAL WORLD. Among all this high-technology I had quite a pleasant and interesting surprise. As I walked around looking at the “newest or fastest or most cutting edge” whatever—I ran across paper! Two booths to be exact. Consolidated Paper and Sappi (S.D. Warren) had booths at this premier Silicon Valley area event to distribute information on their digital imaging papers. It was very interesting to see all of the high-tech types, in their best dressed down casual look—no ties please—stop by these booths. They didn’t have flashy new display screens, or new printers, or something else really high-tech that everyone wanted to see. What they were doing was explaining to people all about the different kinds of paper, and why coated papers offered such better image reproduction for high-end output. It was pretty funny too because I noticed several people that couldn’t at first figure out what they were selling! They asked things like “do you make printers?” Sappi’s display outlined its SpectraTech line of papers, including coated and uncoated office papers for ink jet use. Consolidated Paper’s showed its Futura Laser coated papers, marketed as a “print-on-demand” product. It’s described as the first coated paper exclusively designed for dry toner laser printers and copiers. It illustrates how this whole area holds such potential for printing papers.

ELECTRONIC BOOKS. In contrast, a very interesting product receiving quite a bit of attention was the new Softbook system, whose goal is to eliminate paper. It’s an electronic book or pad that provides a means to prepare, distribute and read—or consume content, as its called in computer-ease—information. The eBook reader holds up to 50,000 pages of content and is trying to become an electronic book. It was neat but still pretty big.

SOURCES FOR SUBSTRATES. At other booths, a number of very interesting displays touted other types of “media,” and here I mean substrates, for use with their printers. One company was selling its wide format printer, with a display that illustrated its use for posters and other larger products. What was interesting is that the same company was selling its own media, which included not only paper, but film substrates.

At another major supplier of printers, copiers and digital document handling equipment, Xerox, it was very interesting to note that they were pushing their own brand of paper. It’s a very high quality, cast coated grade designed again for high-end photographic quality image reproduction.

At another stand, I saw a similar product line for a similar digital printer line, and what was most interesting there is that they’ve decided to go into the paper business! Well, not making paper, but they are distributing the brand of paper they sell for their OEM equipment to distributors to sell to consumers and business.

And finally, as the culmination of my overall widely varied conference experience, I was brought back down to earth as I was leaving the show. And this reminded me that paper is an integral part of the world, but that competition never ends. I came around the corner and saw: synthetic paper. Yupo Synthetic Paper Co. has an interesting product because it has a very smooth surface that reproduces images and text very well. It certainly isn’t what I normally think of as synthetic paper, which is the rough feeling envelopes we put Fedex in. They were illustrating things like postcards and product brochures with high quality, four-color pictures and art.

It all just struck me how intertwined paper is in many facets of business and life. To see it displayed as a key component in the distribution and reproduction of digitized four-color information was good. Makes me think paper still has a future after all.