Canon has announced the launch of an online community, GraphiPlaza, for large format graphics experts. Free to access for customers, Canon partners and employees, the platform offers a global network of expertise to improve business practices. 

The online resource is intended to provide information about market trends, to share best practices around the world and to discover new applications. It offers an extensive manufacturer-independent media profile database compatible with the Canon Arizona flatbed and Colorado roll-to-roll printer families, with advanced search capabilities. User and technical documentation plus firmware and other software updates are also available. GraphiPlaza offers an interactive forum for discussions with peers, categorised by topic.

Dirk Brouns, vice president, Large Format Graphics at Canon Production Printing, explained, ‘Large format graphics is an industry that thrives on creativity. It’s amazing to see the wealth of applications we can address and how our customers, our partners and our specialists always find new and better ways to use our technology. With the launch of GraphiPlaza, it’s our ambition to connect our entire graphics community – customers, partners and our own specialists – to unlock this creative potential for everybody.‘

The platform, which is GDPR-compliant and meets Canon’s security regulations, is moderated by a team of employees from Canon’s Production Printing headquarters, supported by the regional sales organisations.

 ‘GraphiPlaza is one of the key strategic projects that emphasises our ‘experts talking to experts’ philosophy here at Canon. By launching the platform, we are facilitating the exchange of relevant information between us, as a large format solutions provider, and our industry peers, in the most user-friendly way. We are confident that the content on GraphiPlaza will inspire our customers to push the boundaries of print, help our partners to maximise their business opportunities, and offer our employees a platform to learn more about best practice printing in collaboration with our customers worldwide,’ added Mathieu Peeters, senior director, strategic marketing Large Format Graphics at Canon.