Smithers Pira is predicating that the digitally printed textile market will be worth 2.42billion Euro by 2021. Its newly published report, ‘The Future of Digital Textile Printing to 2021’ values the current market at 1.17billion Euro and forecasts an annual average growth of 12.3% to 2021.
Smithers’ analysis tracks how this will drive an even more rapid increase in the volume of fabric printed with inkjet equipment - from 870 million/m² in 2016 to 1.95 billion/m² in 2021 - a 17.5% CAGR.
The new report follows ‘The Future of Dye-Sublimation Printing to 2021’ published by the consultancy at the start of the year, in which it stated that the amount of fabric printed digitally via dye sublimation would rise to 892m/m2 by 2021.
“Global near-exponential growth rates cannot be sustained in the long-run as a market matures; but several very high growth regions remain,” said Dr Justin Hayward, author of the report. “The revolution digital printing has created in graphics, and more recently in ceramics, shows a market penetration of over 70% can occur within a few years, if there is extensive cost parity or better, and if barriers to change are removed.”
According to the report the market share for digital processes is 2.8% of overall volume just now, but is set to boom in a segment where the mean growth is just 3%. The greatest acceleration across the study period is expected to be in clothing, with household textiles growing at the next fastest rate. It is thought soft signage will grow somewhat more slowly –from a larger base - but will maintain double digit annual growth across the period. This will convert into the largest absolute increase in value for 2016-2021. Technical textiles are expected to lose ground slightly, indicative of a lack of visibility of, or focus on, these smaller niche markets.