In a research document published this week, Scitex Vision vice president product marketing Lilach Sapir said that roll-to-roll printing was still only financially viable using solvent inks.
The study by the Israeli firm showed that the total production cost of printing on a 5m-wide roll-to-roll ink-jet printer was 89p ($1.62) per m sq when solvent inks were used, compared to 1.23 for UV inks.
Sapir said that UV curable ink prices would have to drop from the current price of 55 per litre to around 27 to make the process "economically viable".
For flatbed printing, Sapir estimated that the production cost of four-colour screen printing was still marginally cheaper than UV-cured, at 2.09 per m2 compared to 2.13.
Story by Josh Brooks
Scitex: UV inks are not financially viable
Scitex Vision has warned that UV ink prices will need to drop by up to half if printers are to justify investments in large-format UV printing kit.
