Koenig & Bauer CEO Sees Optimistic Future

Highlights:

Offering the industry’s widest and most comprehensive portfolio across all manufacturing segments that enhances efficiency, profitability, and a competitive advantage
Strengthened Koenig & Bauer's position in the North American market as a trusted advisor and proven leader in supporting customers
Advancing training as a strategic priority to attract the next generation of talent, including an expanded focus on its apprenticeship program

As he begins a new year in his dual role as CEO and CFO of Koenig & Bauer (US/CA), Gerrit Zwergel is applying decades of leadership to help customers capture the industry’s next wave of opportunity across packaging, commercial, label, and emerging segments. With more than 40 years at Koenig & Bauer, Zwergel brings a steady, long-range perspective on what printers need now and what they will need next: practical AI adoption, streamlined process digitalization and production ecosystems that turn data into decisions, while remaining completely sustainable.

Under his vision, Koenig & Bauer is expanding innovation across offset and postpress systems while strengthening its digital toolkit, including the myKyana ecosystem from Koenig & Bauer Kyana and authentication solutions such as Stegano provided by Koenig & Bauer Vision & Protection. Equally important, the company will continue investing in people. Koenig & Bauer’s long-standing commitment to building the future workforce remains a priority, with additional emphasis on expanding its renowned apprenticeship program.

“I believe 2026 will be an exciting year for the graphic arts industry as well as for our own company,” states Zwergel. “We see optimism in the marketplace as purchasing levels have returned. Our exceptional North American team and our European manufacturers strongly support our valued customers by consulting with them on process improvements and providing reporting systems for data-driven workflow analysis. We are continually focusing on investing internally in the highest automation, emphasizing optimization and digitalization across all segments. Our focus is to ensure our customers can differentiate themselves in their respective markets while identifying major consumer and industrial trends.”

Zwergel sees the cornerstone of the organization continually focusing on its service and parts initiatives to continue supporting its customers as the industry’s leading trusted advisor. Its COO Chris Talbert is 100 percent focused on further developing the firm’s wide breadth of support infrastructure including the customer service specialist team and the continual integration of AI to provide the highest uptime and net throughput for its customers.

What can Koenig & Bauer customers look forward to? Plans call for introducing the industry’s leading innovations geared toward the highest automation, consistent print quality, along with the expansion of newly developed reporting systems. Koenig & Bauer’s 208-year core focus will remain on training operational, mechanical, electrical, and maintenance teams to guarantee its customers swift implementation of its new technology.

Koenig & Bauer has long maintained a strong focus on packaging, label, commercial, and emerging markets. New product introductions, including CI flexo technology, corrugated high board line portfolio, the RotaJET digital web-fed press, and the VariJET digital inkjet sheetfed press, will allow printers to offer a wider range of applications and deliver more value to their customers. Its Rapida line for sheetfed presses – ranging from half and mid to large formats – consists of highly competitive machines recognized for their superior automation, highest operating speed, and unique custom configurations that position them among the top choices in the industry. Koenig & Bauer will continue its strong investment into postpress solutions for die-cutting and folder gluers in order to provide complete integrated systems through its holistic platforms. A common thread for the organization is having all of its systems integrate modularity, sustainability and digitalization.

“Our management team is developing programs to financially address customer investments in 2026 and beyond,” says Zwergel. “We’ll be reaching printers in a grassroots effort by supporting over 30 national and local industry associations. Ultimately, we will continue to be the leading choice in the graphic arts industry with a major focus on developing new talent for our customers and our own organization. I am proud to lead our forward-thinking management team and complete organization into the future as we evolve with the dynamic marketplace while introducing game-changing new technology.”

Source: Koenig & Bauer

The preceding press release was provided by a company unaffiliated with Printing Impressions. The views expressed within may not directly reflect the thoughts or opinions of the staff of Printing Impressions.