TOPA conference draws 500+ printers across Telangana

More than 500 printers from across Telangana attended the conference of South India Offset Printers hosted by Telangana Offset Printers Association (TOPA) in Hyderabad to discuss how to build the future while printing today.

29 Jul 2015 | 5536 Views | By PrintWeek India

TOPA represents a vibrant print industry comprising of offset printers from ten districts of Telangana. There are more than 1,000 printers with Hyderabad and Secunderabad sharing the highest density while small and medium presses are scattered in the remaining nine districts.

The first session of the conference saw the chief guest S Niranjan Reddy, vice-chairman of Telangana State Planning Commission inaugurate the conference. Ravindra Reddy, president of TOPA welcomed the guest and D Radhakrishna, treasurer highlighted few common issues faced by the printers of Telangana. “One of them is power tariff. Printers are paying an exorbitant cost per unit, and that has to be on the terms provided to the industries,” he said. At present, the power tariff for printing industry is on par to commercial rates."

Promising to recommend a change in power tariff, the chief guest, said, “There is a demand for quality packaging. If the print industry of Telangana has to grow it will need support from the government, for it’s an industry that can initiate growth for the state.”

The chief guest also promised to recommend to the government, allotment of land for the association.

In the second part of the conference, P Chander of Artisan Company and former chairman of AIFMP advised the printers to focus on a single area of specialised printing. “Create a niche for your company,” he said, which recommending the audience to ready the book, Print 2022 by Frank Romano.

There were other speakers too. Vinod Nawab of ParamERP, Vinay Kaushal of Provin Technos, and Chakrapani Vemula of Heidelberg India.

Nawab highlighted three tiers of printing. He said, “Planning, process and people will define the measure of quality. But while managing the press, data management will be the key factor. You can’t simply rely on instinct alone to make a decision,” he said.

Both Kaushal of Provin and Chakrapani of Hyderabad spoke about the success of their presses. Kaushal said that in the past 18 months, his company sold 38 presses, some of which will be coming to Telangana. Heidelberg’s regional sales manager Chakrapani said the company has an installation base of 393 presses in India, a total staff of 104, out of which 62 are dedicated to service, and spare parts are made available within 1-5 days of order.

During the conference, TOPA honoured Satish Pathak of Lok Vijay Press, the 105-year old printing press, perhaps the oldest printing press in the state.

The conference was supported by Provin Technos, Heidelberg, TechNova, Pragati and TGS India.

TOPA conference draws 500+ printers across Telangana

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