A new report from UK-based research and consulting firm Smithers Pirapredicts solid growth in the thermal printing market over the next five years.

In its report, The Future of Thermal Printing to 2021, Smithers Pira values global thermal printing at $31.8 billion in 2016 and projects it to grow at a compound annual growth rate of 3.9 percent during the coming five years.

Thermal printing is a digital process that uses a heating-element head to transfer resin- or wax-based colors from a carrier sheet (a ribbon or foil) to a substrate medium. There are three basic types of thermal printers: direct thermal, thermal mass transfer and dye diffusion thermal transfer. All use the same basic principle: the application of heat generated in the digitally controlled heated elements of the printhead to create the images. Common applications include labels, bar codes, price tags, and other specialty print jobs.

The report finds that there are fundamentally two sets of driving forces behind the increase in the size of the thermal printing market. First is general economic growth, which affects the level of use and activity of the existing printing applications with direct impact on the consumption of thermal printing supplies. The second group involves the factors that influence end-users’ decisions in selecting thermal printing to solve their business problems, based on the benefits and inherent advantages of the technology.

The largest market for thermal printing is the Asian-Pacific region at about 35 percent. The next-largest is North America at about 27 percent. The North American market is expected to grow at an annual growth rate of 3 percent through 2021, based on end-user price level. The third largest market for thermal printing is Western Europe, which currently accounts for about 22 percent of the global market and has a projected annual growth rate of 3.1 percent through 2021.

The Smithers Pira report divides the thermal printing market into eight end-user segments, including: retail; manufacturing; transportation and logistics; health care; commercial services; entertainment and hospitality; and government. One additional segment, identified as “other,” includes unrelated lines of business such as energy, construction, mining, engineering, etc. that are difficult to categorize.

While Smithers Pira’s headquarters is in the U.K., its North American headquarters are in Akron, Ohio, and the company also has a distribution testing laboratory in Lansing, Michigan.