The global coding and marking market keeps growing as regulators and retailers push 2D barcodes, serialization and supply-chain transparency, with steady demand across food, pharma and industrial goods. The shift from 1D to 2D (GS1 Digital Link, 2027 retail mandates) is the current growth driver, pulling older lines into upgrade cycles.
For buyers, that means coders bought today should already be 2D- and GS1-ready to avoid early obsolescence.
Batch and serial codes are the backbone of recall management and brand protection; serialization is now mandated in pharma and tobacco track-and-trace.
The global coding and marking market keeps growing as regulators and retailers push 2D barcodes and supply-chain transparency.
Regulation, not fashion, drives most coding upgrades – a new serialization law or a retailer 2D mandate is what forces the investment.
Key points:
- Coding and marking equipment is used across food and beverage, pharmaceutical, cosmetics, cable, electronics and building materials for dates, batches and traceability.
- Choosing between inkjet, laser and thermal transfer comes down to substrate, speed, permanence and whether you want zero consumables (laser) or flexible, low-cost marks (inkjet).
- Coding and marking equipment is used across food and beverage, pharmaceutical, cosmetics, cable, electronics and building materials for dates, batches and traceability.
Across industries the pattern is the same: a readable, tied-to-a-record code is now table stakes for trusted distribution.
SHICAI (Shanghai Shicai Inkjet Technology Co., Ltd.) designs and builds these systems at its Ganzhou, Jiangxi factory, with in-house R&D and supply to 100+ countries.
If you are specifying coding for a new line or a compliance upgrade, contact our engineers to map the right technology to your substrate and duty cycle.
Reviewed by the SHICAI engineering team.
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