Overseas Vision| Smart Debt Is Eating Away At Your Profits? Are You Ready For This Efficiency Revolution

Overseas Vision|" "Smart debt" is eating away at your profits? Are you ready for this efficiency revolution?

Recently, GelatoConnect, a global software solution provider, released a "2026 Intelligent Printing Production Status Report". It is understood that the report is based on a survey of global printing service providers (PSPs) conducted in January ~ February 2026. The trends in the report show that the printing industry is entering a new stage of development: automation has become a basic requirement for printing companies, and competitive advantages are changing to intelligence.

Some of the key takeaways from the report are as follows:

The need for intelligence is imminent

78% of print service providers said they would go smart within the year, and 35% said they would act now. Only 9% of respondents said there was no urgency.

Most operations remain "hybrid."

70% of print service providers described their production processes as a "hybrid" of manual and automated processes, and only 9% of respondents said they had achieved a high level of optimization. 39% of respondents said that less than a quarter of the end-to-end workflow from order receipt to fulfillment is automated.

The confidence gap is gradually emerging and widening

100% of the most intelligent providers surveyed are confident in growth in 2026. Among companies with slower intelligence, only 44% of respondents hold the same view.

Lack of expertise is the biggest obstacle, not budget

65% of respondents cited a lack of expertise as the biggest barrier to AI adoption, nearly double the proportion of respondents who were uncertain about return on investment (ROI) (30%). This is followed by integration challenges at 44%, reflecting the fragmented technology environment of many print service providers.

Investment focus is shifting from "more tools" to "connected systems": 83% of respondents plan to invest in workflow automation this year. Smart estimation and order receipt each attracted 48% of investment intentions, indicating a growing demand for faster quotes and better customer experiences.

"Intelligent debt" is real and accumulating

If a company adopts an intelligent system every night and quarter, it means that competitors will have an additional quarter of technology iteration cycle and customer experience optimization space, and gradually widen the gap. Unlike traditional automation, which brings fixed efficiency improvements, intelligence will continue to accumulate advantages over time, and if we wait and see, the competitive gap may further widen.

The report also found that smart quoting is the most common entry point for printing service providers to integrate intelligence into their operations. Automated estimation is currently the most widely used AI capability (22%), with 48% of respondents planning to invest in an intelligent estimation system in 2026.

It can be seen that intelligence is no longer an option in the printing industry, but a must-answer question related to the survival and development of enterprises, and the industry is undergoing a profound change from automation to intelligence. In this change, only with knowledge reserve as the cornerstone, system integration as the starting point, and customer experience as the guide, printing enterprises can seize the opportunity in the new stage of intelligence and achieve a leap from efficiency competition to value creation.