Printing machinery is a general term for machines and equipment used to produce printed matter.
In recent years, my country’s printing and printing equipment output value has ranked among the top in the world, becoming a veritable printing power. Its international competitiveness has simultaneously improved, its export scale has steadily expanded, and its trade surplus has increased year by year.
According to Chinese customs data, my country’s printing machinery exports totaled US$4.207 billion in 2025, a year-on-year increase of 14.1%, of which pre-press equipment accounted for 5.3%, India-China equipment accounted for 64.5%, and post-press equipment accounted for 30.2%.
The industrial chain of my country’s printing machinery industry takes midstream complete machine manufacturing as the core hub. The upstream connects the supply chain of raw materials and core components, and the downstream extends to various printing services and terminal application markets. It is also supplemented by supporting supporting industries such as technology research and development, equipment operation and maintenance, and consumables to form a complete and mature industrial system.
The upstream is the basic support of the industrial chain, which determines the performance, cost and reliability of the equipment. It mainly includes raw material suppliers such as aluminum, copper, plastic, rubber, resin, and wood, as well as key component suppliers such as bearings, gears, linear guides, motors, reducers, controllers, nozzles, lasers, and image processing chips. The midstream of the industry is the research and development, design, and production of printing machinery. The downstream of the industry is mainly oriented to the printing market, covering packaging printing, publishing printing, commercial printing, special printing, label printing, and many other fields.
In terms of market competition, high-end printing equipment deeply integrates multiple core technologies such as precision machinery manufacturing, intelligent automatic control, precise color calibration and professional printing technology.
After a century of technological accumulation, international giants hold massive core patents and mature and complete process systems, setting up extremely high technology research and development thresholds.
At the same time, a huge amount of capital has been invested in the research and development of high-end models, the construction of production lines, and the implementation of trial production. The capital recovery cycle is long, and it requires long-term continuous heavy investment in the layout.
In addition, high-end printing equipment has extremely strict requirements on operating accuracy, production speed, and overall machine operation stability. The debugging experience and quality control system accumulated in long-term market operations are difficult to replicate in the short term.
Therefore, internationally renowned companies represented by Heidelberg, Manroland, BOBST, HP, Kodak, Komori, and Mitsubishi have long dominated my country’s high-end printing machinery market.
With the advantages of high cost performance, local scene adaptability, flexible customized services, efficient nearby after-sales system and complete local industrial chain supporting, leading local companies occupy a large share of the mid-to-low-end market and gradually expand to the high-end market.
At present, the listed companies in my country’s printing machinery industry mainly include Wanjie Technology, Runtianzhi, Dongfang Precision, Evergreen Co., Ltd., Weigang Technology, Honghua Digital, Aisika, etc.
From the perspective of revenue, Dongfang Precision’s revenue has always ranked first in the industry, increasing from 3.525 billion yuan in 2021 to 5.229 billion yuan in 2025, continuing to play a leading role; Evergreen’s revenue has maintained steady growth, increasing from 1.467 billion yuan in 2021 to 1.624 billion yuan in 2025, demonstrating strong operating resilience and market competitiveness.
Honghua Digital is the company with the most prominent growth momentum in the industry, with revenue rapidly expanding from 943.1 million yuan in 2021 to 2.303 billion yuan in 2025, leading the industry in compound growth rate; although Wanjie Technology and Runtianzhi have relatively small revenue scales, their growth trends are stable; Weigan Technology and Kaiteng Precision Industry’s revenue has shown a moderate upward trend, while Aisika’s revenue has relatively small fluctuations.
In the future, competition in my country’s printing machinery industry will be driven by technological innovation, and the deep integration of digitalization and intelligence will become a key direction for corporate breakthroughs.
Printing equipment will gradually get rid of a single production function and upgrade to multi-functional integration and full-process collaboration. By integrating technologies such as artificial intelligence and the Internet of Things, intelligent equipment operation and maintenance, automatic production scheduling and precise control will be realized, and production flexibility and efficiency will be improved.
At the same time, the independence of core technologies has become the focus of competition. Enterprises will increase investment in research and development in high-end control systems, key components and other fields, break down overseas technical barriers, promote domestic breakthroughs in core technologies such as digital printing and intelligent post-press, and build competitive barriers with technological advantages.
With the further advancement of the “One Belt, One Road” cooperation initiative and the continued prominence of the cost-effective advantages of domestic printing equipment, the international market space of my country’s printing machinery will further expand, and the export scale is expected to further expand.
