What do you get when you bring together print providers, industry analysts and vendors for three days to talk about the future of the printing industry? One of the most beneficial, productive and exciting events of the year, the Inkjet Summit.

The second annual Inkjet Summit, organized by nGage Events, along with publishing partner, Printing Impressions, was held April 7-9 at the beautiful Ponte Vedra Inn & Club in Ponte Vedra Beach, FL. This invitation-only, small group event boasts a unique atmosphere to learn about today’s issues and trends in the print industry and tomorrow’s technology advancements and solutions. Because of the intimate setting, attendees and industry experts are able to focus on building relationships to better understand and advance their needs. The Inkjet Summit plays a vital role to help further strategic partnerships which provide sound guidance to Print Service Providers looking to grow their businesses.

For the second year in a row, Canon was a proud Keynote sponsor of the wildly successful Summit. As the worldwide inkjet market share leader and recipient of last year’s “Company to Watch”, being an active participant and a Keynote Sponsor of an event like this, gives us the unique opportunity to interact with customers and learn what makes their business successful. More notably, we are able to foster thought leadership and development in the area of inkjet technology.

Throughout the event, we engaged in meaningful conversations with attendees during dedicated 1:1 meetings. We learned about their challenges and successes in the marketplace and discussed how we can help our customers expand their service offerings with the right inkjet solution that can improve cost efficiency and operating at higher profit margins.

In addition, as a Keynote sponsor, we had the opportunity to present four Case Study sessions focusing on our customers’ successes in the Transactional, Book, Direct Mail, and Commercial segments by adding inkjet to their portfolio. Our customers showcased their experiences with diving into this new technology and why it is beneficial for their company’s bottom line. Because of the wonderful presentations that highlighted the value of inkjet solutions, the attendees voted for Canon to win the “Best Vendor Case Study” award, one of only two awards given out at the event. We are honored to receive this award and are always excited to partner with our customers to help them take advantage of this fast growing technology.

We had an amazing time at the 2014 Inkjet Summit. From peer panels and educational breakout sessions to delicious dinners and impeccable networking opportunities, the Inkjet Summit had a little bit of everything. We are already looking forward to next year and the bright future of inkjet technology in the printing industry.

Tonya Powers is the Graphic Arts Segment Marketing Manager for Canon, with a focus on marketing strategies across North America in the Commercial and Book print production markets. She brings with her a wealth of industry knowledge that enables her to lead field relevant go-to-market production print strategies and programs for Canon that bring value-add to the production print customer and print industry.

Previous to Canon, Tonya spent several years at Hewlett Packard on the marketing team developing go-to-market strategies within the Graphics Solutions Business for their Wide Format and Digital Press & Inkjet divisions.

Tonya has been in marketing roles identifying and implementing B2B marketing strategies since 1999.