The CIP4 Organization is the engine room...
Most people don't even consider what happens when a computer is turned on. First, the BIOS gets started, the hard drives, the screen drivers, the operating system and this happens if not instant then seamlessly with many hours of work behind it. In the printing industry, we work towards standards that enable us to deliver better quality, higher output, higher consistency, and easier exchange of data between the processes.
We know this happens, but most people probably don't even think about who makes this happen and how it's done.
CIP4 is the community that makes this happen, and a couple of times a year the engineers from vendors and printers meet at different locations in the world to test, to define, to develop the standard that we are all depending on - namely CIP3, CIP4, JDF, and XJDF.
We got the chance to participate at the recent Inter-OP in Copenhagen and got the opportunity to speak to CTO Rainer Prosi who represents both CIP4 as well as Heidelberg. Enjoy!