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CFO of NUR Macroprinters looking for improved performance in second half driven by introduction of new printers Full article published: 02/24/2003     HILEL KREMER is the Chief Financial Officer of NUR Macroprinters Ltd.


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TWST: Let’s begin with an introduction to Nur Macroprinters (NasdaqNM:NURM), including you core activities today?

Mr. Kremer: The Company was established in 1991 and started selling its product in 1992. We sell wide-format digital printers for the out-of-home advertising market, which means the people who buy our machines are printers who print media used in the out-of-home advertising world. The type of applications that our customers will print will be billboards, fleet graphics, exhibition signage, stage graphics, scaffolding covers and building wraps, and so on. Our customers’ products are sold into a $38 billion dollars, so it’s a big print market, and we sell digital equipment and the products that go with the machines to these printers. The prints been made in this market are still predominantly done by conventional method of printing. Our mission is to replace conventional printing methods with our digital printers. About half of our sales are machine sales and another half are after-machine sales, i.e. inks, substrates and services.

TWST: How has the overall slow economic environment and decline in advertising spend impacted the out-of-home space in particular?

Mr. Kremer: The growth of our sales is generated by two major drivers. One of them is the technology transition from conventional printing to digital printing, and this has continued with people changing equipment regardless of economic conditions. Here it is a market share situation -- if you have better technology this year, then they will buy more from us but then next year they may end up buying from competition. The second driver is the overall advertising market. It’s worth noting that the out-of-home advertising market in particular has been referred to as the potato of advertisement, which means it is the lowest cost per viewer market, and as a result in hard times the market is the least hurt. So, our customers didn’t see too much revenue decline and there was not therefore that much affect on us. In fact, our digital printer customers were getting some business from the conventional printers, which meant overall our customers continued to print as much as they had printed in previous years. What has happen, however, is first of all the banks have tied in their credit policies and it is now more difficult for customers to finance the equipment. Second, customers are now more conservative about their purchase decisions, so we’ve see a much longer sales cycle than we used to. I think one of the reasons we have had a downturn is based on our own portfolio of equipment. I would say that it was not very competitive during the end of 2001 and 2002, but that we’ll be very competitive in the second half of 2003.

TWST: As a reflection of the product development initiatives?

Mr. Kremer: That’s right. We’re going to bring some new products to the market in the second half of 2003.

TWST: Can you summarize your key objectives for 2003, including some details on new products?

Mr. Kremer: Strategically, the corporate mission continuous to be a leading provider of total digitally-based printing solutions for the out-of-home advertising market, and that will continue to be the case. Financially we will focus on improving our profitability and cash flow levels at the current level of sales and look for an upside at the second half of the year, with the introduction of new printers. Now, in terms of the next couple of months, we’re coming up with a new product that will address a specific media niche in our industry, i.e. printing on rigid material. We are developing a machine called Tempo, which was exhibited already in October 2002 in the SJIA show. We start beta in Q2 and it should be released sometime toward the end of Q3 beginning of Q4. This machine will be able to print on card form, plastics, glass, ceramic, all types of rigid materials, so this is a new niche for us in the out of home advertising market. Because of the flexibility of these printers, we will probably also go into new applications that our customers haven’t considered today. We believe the new line of printers will be the most cost effective for our customer in terms of productivity and quality of print. The other major developments will be increasing the productivity and quality of our current printers.


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This interview is a small excerpt from a comprehensive interview published in The Wall Street Transcript on 02/24/03. For more information call (212) 952 7400. The Wall Street Transcript does not endorse any of the comments made by interviewees, and does not make stock recommendations.

Copyright 2003, Wall Street Transcript Corp.

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