By the way, it seems that the author forgot to mention that one of the 'western' innovations was the adjustable mould. Basically it is a device where you can put matrices of different width, used to cast lead types; in that way you can cast letters like /i/ or /m/ or even ligatures etc. with the same mould. I must add that I don't know if Gutenberg actually invented the mould as we know it (according to James Mosley[] the mould was first described in the XVI century).

[] http://typefoundry.blogspot.it/2007/04/drawing-typefounders-...