Open innovation as a route to circular print

At this year’s Cradle to Cradle Congress in Berlin, the Print the Change cooperative offered a concrete example of what open innovation can look like in practice.

Print the Change brings together Gugler Medien in Austria, KLS PurePrint in Denmark and Vögeli in Switzerland - three printing companies serving a range of commercial print and packaging applications. Vugge til Vugge works with all three on Cradle to Cradle Certified® assessment.

At the Congress, Janni Toft Nielsen, CEO of KLS PurePrint, and Markus Vögeli, Owner and CEO of Vögeli AG, took part in the session “From Ink to Toilet Paper: C2C in Printing, Packaging, and Hygiene,” where they explored the value of sharing knowledge and solutions developed around the specific technical challenges of the print sector.

What makes the model particularly interesting is that competing printing companies share part of the technical and certification-related groundwork needed to advance circular print, while continuing to operate independently in their own markets.

The session made clear why that matters. The circularity of printed products depends on much more than the choice of paper. It reaches into inks, coatings, adhesives, finishing processes, supplier information and the chemistry of the finished product.

Print the Change turns some of that complexity into shared capacity. Its members pool material knowledge, development experience and learning around Cradle to Cradle Certified®, while the model remains open to additional printing companies that want to join.

That makes it a useful example of private open innovation in practice: sharing the foundations needed to accelerate circular print while preserving competition where companies create their own value.

Paper is only the start

In print, circularity is determined by the finished product, not the paper alone.

Inks, coatings, adhesives and finishing processes all become part of what goes into circulation. Their chemistry affects whether fibres can retain value through further cycles and what substances travel with them when the material is recovered.

For the companies involved in Print the Change, developing Cradle to Cradle Certified® products has therefore involved detailed work on material composition, supplier information and the interaction between the different elements of print.

The principle is straightforward:

The circularity of a printed product depends on everything that goes into it. 

And much of that technical challenge is common across the industry.

Why solve the same technical problem three times?

Developing suitable material combinations, gathering supplier data, testing alternatives and preparing materials for certification requires specialist knowledge and significant effort.

Print the Change allows participating companies to build on work that has already been done rather than beginning every development journey from zero. Members can draw on accumulated know-how, certified materials and shared experience in material development and certification.

Its potential also extends beyond the three current partners. The cooperative is open to additional qualifying printing companies, giving other businesses in the sector the opportunity to build on that shared foundation rather than reproduce it independently.

For Janni Toft Nielsen, CEO of KLS PurePrint, that cooperation is a strategic business choice as much as a circular one:

“By helping each other implement Cradle to Cradle Certified® in our businesses, we create economic value together.”

For Markus Vögeli, Owner and CEO of Vögeli AG, cooperation and competition remain entirely compatible:

“With the cooperative, we will always be at least one step ahead of the competition.”

Open innovation, with competition still intact

That apparent tension is precisely what makes the model interesting.

The companies continue to compete for customers, develop their own market positions and build their own businesses.

What changes is the boundary around what needs to remain proprietary.

Material knowledge, tested solutions, certification experience and parts of the technical development process can become more valuable when they are shared. Repeating the same foundational work independently adds cost and time without necessarily creating meaningful differentiation.

This is private open innovation: opening selected parts of the innovation process while preserving competition where differentiation matters.

Share the foundation. Compete on what you build with it.

For circular industries, that distinction is increasingly important. Companies often depend on the same suppliers, recovery systems, material technologies, standards and data structures. Building some of that capacity collectively can accelerate the market that all of them ultimately need.

Certification can create a common language

Cradle to Cradle Certified® provides a shared framework around areas including Material Health and Product Circularity. For companies working together, that can create greater consistency in how materials and product performance are understood.

Certification remains product- and company-specific. An assessed material does not automatically make another finished product certified.

But experience can accumulate.

Suppliers become familiar with the information required. Material solutions can be built upon. Companies can draw on previous development work rather than repeatedly returning to the same starting point.

For Vugge til Vugge, working with all three members of Print the Change gives us a close view of this collaborative potential. Certification requires detailed product, material, and supplier information. Working within a common methodology makes some of that accumulated knowledge easier to build on.

From individual progress to sector capacity

Print the Change adds another dimension to the wider shift we explored in our recent article, “Cars from Cars, Buildings from Buildings, Shoes from Shoes”: circularity increasingly depends on the systems around individual products as much as on the products themselves.

The print sector shows that some of those systems can be built directly by companies.

A pre-competitive layer of shared knowledge, tested materials and development experience can lower barriers for those already involved — and for new companies joining the model.

That principle travels well beyond printing.

Some capabilities genuinely create competitive distinction. Others become more valuable when more companies can use them.

Open innovation starts with knowing the difference: what to protect, and what to open.