PRESSIdeas January 2021 Issue by Jacob George

21 vol-21 Issue- 01 January 2021

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Price in India : Rs.100

Vol.21 Issue 01, 2021

Replika expands with 3rd SM CS92.............06 Kansal Graphics opts for KODAK CtP..........10 WPH: A unique initiative by MMS................14 ‘Do More’ with Canon.......................................22 EFI: Proud technology prowess....................25

A monthly Publication from PRESSIdeas Publishing Pvt. Ltd.

Xerox unveils suite of innovations...............26 Mouvent Cluster opens a new chapter.....28 HP’s latest Latex portfolio...............................38

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Contents FROM THE EDITORS’ DESK.............................................................................................................................................................................................................5 Replika expands with third Heidelberg Speedmaster CS 92............................................................................................................................................6 Komori India to launch world class G40 & GX40 Advance in Online Event.................................................................................................................9 Heidelberg decides to sell PMA to Luxembourg-based Co..............................................................................................................................................9 Kansal Graphics opts for Kodak Trendsetter CtP ............................................................................................................................................................... 10 Multi-Bookbinding improves thread-sewn book quality and sets to zero return rate with 100% product integrity check.......................................................................................................................................... 12 World Print Hub: An Open Platform for the Global Print Community....................................................................................................................... 14 Automation to take care of shorter runs and lead times, Rajesh Nema.................................................................................................................... 16 Shaping the Future of Books Webinar by Intergraf........................................................................................................................................................... 17

Jasmeet D. Editor & Publisher (jasmeet@pressideas.com) Vineet K G. Associate Editor (vineetkg@pressideas.com) Jasvinder S. Sub-Editor (jasvinder@pressideas.com)

‘Printech Park Cluster’ in Harohalli.......................................................................................................................................................................................... 17 The first CorruFLEX off to a successful start......................................................................................................................................................................... 18 INX International increases Technical Services for Commercial and Packaging printers ................................................................................... 19 Publishing industry reels under rising Newsprint cost ................................................................................................................................................... 20 Digital Media India 2021 announced .................................................................................................................................................................................... 21 WAN-IFRA: Media Freedom Programme for Sub-Saharan Africa................................................................................................................................. 21 Canon India: Helping customers ‘Do More’ for each investment................................................................................................................................. 22 Budget Reaction on First Digital Budget 2021: Xerox India........................................................................................................................................... 24 EFI steers through crisis by proud technology prowess................................................................................................................................................. 25 Xerox reveals Suite of Production Print Innovations ....................................................................................................................................................... 26 Mouvent Cluster: Opening a new chapter for label production.................................................................................................................................. 28

Jacob George Marketing and Sales (jacob@pressideas.com) M.S. Mukundan Advertising and Sales Southern and Western India (aims@pressideas.com) Graphic Designer Anil Kumar

Gallus to remain with Heidelberg .......................................................................................................................................................................................... 30 NOVA by OMET: Represents a new frontier for customer assistance ........................................................................................................................ 30 Bellissima DMS now available in India................................................................................................................................................................................... 31 NBG to represent Huayang CI flexo presses in India........................................................................................................................................................ 32 Calendar by DuPont shows Flexo power.............................................................................................................................................................................. 32 YesGo inaugurates its Premedia Unit SGO........................................................................................................................................................................... 33 Lake Image appoints two BDM to accelerate growth...................................................................................................................................................... 34 CAMIS announces SleeveMaster Auto................................................................................................................................................................................... 34 Highcon and EFI announce global partnership................................................................................................................................................................. 35 ACTEGA is at forefront of Food Safety: Removes Bisphenol A and Epoxysilane from ACTEbond .................................................................. 36

Networking/ Hardware Consultant Sukhdeep Singh USA Correspondents Tensi M., Preeti European Correspondent Rimi, Yadhu Morphine

Gallus High Performance Day 2021........................................................................................................................................................................................ 37 Avery Dennison acquires ACPO .............................................................................................................................................................................................. 37 HP unveils unmatched versatility with latest Latex Printer portfolio......................................................................................................................... 38

Production Thomas K Alex

PRESSIdeas January 2021 Vol. 21, Issue 01 Printed by Jacob George and published by Jasmeet Singh on behalf of PRESSIdeas Publishing Pvt Ltd. Printed in India at Hues and Colors 363, Industrial Focal Point, Phase-IX Mohali, and published at PRESSIdeas, 437-A 1st Floor, Industrial Area, Phase-2 Chandigarh-160002 (India) Every effort has been made to ensure that credits accurately comply with information supplied. All material supplied is compiled from sources believed to be reliable or solely an opinion of the authors. PRESSIdeas is not responsible for any steps taken based on the information provided herewith.

January 2021

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FROM THE EDITORS’ DESK Dear Readers, Continuing with their Heidelberg journey, Replika Press flexes its printing muscle in Commercial Printing, Gift and Luxury Packaging with three Speedmaster presses. As part of their expansion plans, the company has invested in their third Speedmaster CS 92. Bhuvnesh Seth – MD, Sanandan Seth, Director and Vikaran Seth, Director, Replika Press, in conversation with PRESSIdeas, discusses their latest installation and plans. The latest Speedmaster CS 92, equipped with features like Intellistart 3 & AutoPlate, an OEE that can be enhanced, can print 5 crore impression per year. Know more about Replika Press capabilities in our cover story on this printing giant of India. In 2019, when the need to upgrade their aging CtP system was felt by Kansal Graphics, Kodak CtP won hands down as the first choice to equip their new state-of-the-art unit at Derabassi near Chandigarh. Kansal Graphics chose Kodak Trendsetter CtP over the various other options they considered for obvious advantages like its ability to plot CtP plates from Kodak as well as other suppliers. The device is not only extremely power efficient, but also generates low heat, comes with proven Kodak quality and above all, is a perfect fit for Kansal Graphics for its high per hour plate output. Their hunt for a value for money yet sturdy system ended on the advanced Trendsetter which proved a perfect match for them for being a very robust machine which is especially of utmost importance to service providers like Kunal Graphics. WPH is a unique initiative by Mumbai Mudrak Sangh (MMS) & Cyber Alchemist. Tushar Dhote – Immediate Past President, MMS, Chairman and MD, Dhote Offset Technokrafts, who acted as an Advisor, in an interview with PRESSIdeas, gives details about the Project. WPH or World Print Hub is an interactive Open Platform for the Global Print Community. Services like Print Doctor (Ask me anything – AMA) will be available to address issues of the members round the clock and gain the wisdom of the senior members. It is a common platform for the industry people to support each other towards future enhancements and augmentation in the digitalization of the industry. Members will be discussing, brainstorming, suggesting and sharing their thoughts, experiences for the betterment of the industry. Varied services to members include Online Streaming, Library, Learning, Groups creation, Job section, Marketplace, Print Doctor and Advisory etc. In another interview with Mr. Puneet Datta, Senior Director-PPP, Canon India, we know more about how the company is helping customers ‘Do More’ for each Canon investment as he shares his experience about challenges of the pandemic, about innovative methods to serve customers in changed times and more. Among new launches is Komori India unveiling its world class G40 & GX40 Advance in a recent Online Event. Xerox has revealed a Suite of Production Print Innovations addressing industry demand – 9 new products and features by Xerox focus on boosting productivity and profit for print providers. Also read the BOBST Mouvent Cluster story and learn about its opening a new chapter for label production. There are other industry updates on events, installations, technological innovations and more in this January issue of PRESSIdeas. Enjoy Reading!

- Jasvinder Singh, Sub-editor

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Replika expands with third Heidelberg Speedmaster CS 92 Continuing with their Heidelberg journey, Replika Press flexes its printing muscle in Commercial Printing, Gift and Luxury Packaging with three Speedmaster presses.

Bhuvnesh Seth – MD, Sanandan Seth, Director and Vikaran Seth, Director, Replika Press, in conversation with PRESSIdeas, discuss their latest installation and plans. As part of the expansion plans, Replika Press has invested in the third Speedmaster CS 92 four colour press to continue their Heidelberg journey.

Key Notes : > Operating from three units sprawling over an area of 6,46,000 sq.ft, Replika Press prints more than 16,000 titles per year. > The range of titles for reputed international publishers from USA, UK, Germany, Czech Republic, France, Norway, Sweden, New Zealand, Russia, Africa & Brazil etc. > The latest Speedmaster CS 92, equipped with features like Intellistart 3 & AutoPlate, an OEE that can be enhanced, can print 5 crore impression per year.

January 2021

Replika Press is one of the biggest print service providers specializing in book printing, high-end commercial print production, digital printing and now in packaging as well. Operating from three units sprawling over an area of 6,46,000 sq.ft, located at Export Promotion Industrial Park (EPIP) Kundli, Sonepat in Haryana, the company prints more than 16,000 titles per year. The company is the only unit in the country with capabilities for commercial, packaging and corrugation all under one roof. Presently, Sanandan and Vikaran Seth, the brother duo at Replika Press independently look after the publishing and packaging segment. The range of titles comprises everything from monochrome to multi-colour, soft cover to hard cover, medical to scientific, technical to coffee table

books, art books to children books, cookbooks, travel guides, dictionaries, encyclopedias and religious books etc. for reputed international publishers from USA, UK, Germany, Czech Republic, France, Norway, Sweden, New Zealand, Russia, Africa, Brazil etc. Replika Press provides solutions to leading publishers like Penguin Random House, Hachette and Bloomsbury to name a few. Replika entered in gift packaging and luxury packaging in 2017. They entered in mono cartons and corrugated boxes in 2018. The segment is highly challenging and Team Replika prides in providing their customer with innovations and the world class services. Replika handle a paper and board stock of more than

20,000 tons per annum with a production capability of printing 50,000 hard cover and 150,000 soft cover books per day with an aim to achieve a target of 200,000 books per day soon. PRESSIdeas had visited the Replika Press facility on various occasions during the last ten years and have always invariably noticed two fascinating things – one, everything at Replika Press is almost aesthetically picture perfect and two, immaculate condition of the hardware exhibiting clean work area as well as seamlessly set up equipment.

The highly capable Heidelberg Speedmaster CS 92 is well suited for both commercial and packaging Talking about the new Speedmaster installation at Replika Press, Deepak Walia, AGM Sales, Heidelberg India, said, “The Speedmaster CS 92 is well suited for both commercial and packaging. The press not only offers the lowest cost per sheet but also reduced maintenance, thanks to its cylinder surfaces with a high-quality finish and universal gripper systems. The Intellistart 3 shortens setup times. Besides, the semiautomatic plate changer AutoPlate works quickly and precisely at the touch of a button. The data from the press can be measured and OEE ((Overall Equipment Effectiveness) of the press can be enhanced, which makes the press available to print 5 crore impression per year.”

Heidelberg Speedmaster CS 92 is built upon the Speedmaster CD 102 platform. Heidelberg Speedmaster CS 92 can accommodate a wide array of print substrates with thicknesses ranging from 0.03 mm to 0.6 mm. Boasting print speeds of up to 15,000 sheets per hour, this highend press is integrated with Heidelberg’s exclusive Prinect workflow to make operations simple and intuitive.

very appropriate for Replika Press. The Heidelberg has been the obvious choice for Replika Press. Heidelberg is a different story altogether. Be it the built or the output quality of Heidelberg, you don’t see any deviations from the standard, be the machine from China or German plant. The sturdiness of Heidelberg’s is unmatched, and we can see it for ourselves from the merit they have earned. One of the more evident of which is their resale value.”

Heidelberg as the obvious choice Bhuvnesh Seth, said, “Today the market is extremely competitive, and we have to offer best to our customers and in such circumstance, the investment is

The impact of the Covid-19 pandemic has been huge for Replika Press with the domestic business experiencing a fall of almost 50%. Talking about the situation,

pressideas/ commercial printing

Sanandan and Vikaran Seth find the mono carton industry to be very competitive. Replika Press is on firm grounds and sees a bright future for both the publishers’ printing as well as Luxury packaging. The packaging to publisher-printer segment ratio of their turnover would be around 40:60 with an aim to gradually increase the luxury packaging in the coming years.

Bhuvnesh Seth, said, “The domestic business saw a steep fall with Gift and Luxury packaging. The relocation of IPL has affected the mobile business – as India’s favourite sports results in a surge in sales of smartphones. The exports though have been a saving grace.” Replika Press has been manufacturing boxes for mobile phone brands like Oppo and Vivo. The sale declined due to pandemic as well as prevailing sentiments has largely affected the business. “Today printers in India are noticing the distinctive advantage of new printing press investment in terms of productivity advantage

January 2021

and resale value of machinery. Though daily output has increased, yet the pandemic has compromised the situation to an extent. We foresee higher output as the situation improves and conditions normalize,” said Bhuvnesh Seth. He expects the business to pick up in the next financial year as the pandemic effect subsides. Replika has capacity to produce 2,20,000 gift and luxury packaging boxes per day. This prompted Replika Press to venture into mono-cartons, with the installation of the seven-colourpress.

Replika Press has been for the last few years supporting Pragati Wheel School based in East Delhi. In its efforts to help lesser privileged children, it has been contributing towards providing Free Education and Nutrition to around 300 children belonging to poor families. It has also helped set up a Computer Lab and a Stitching Centre in the school. The children are provided free education, books, stationery, a morning snack, mid-day meal and similar things.

pressideas/ commercial printing

Komori India to launch world class G40 & GX40 Advance in Online Event Komori India will launch its world class ROI Lithrone G40 Advance at an online event on 29 January. Advancing forward with the recent changes in the social and economic environment, Komori India will be launching their new World Class ROI G40 & GX 40 Advance for Indian Market. The company is organizing Advance online event 2021 on 29th January. The event to be premiered on Komori India You tube Channel will be the first ever online event by Komori India to connect with the print industry and launch its new product along with introducing the new World Class ROI Lithrone G40 Advance. Since the COVID-19 outbreak, Print Industry globally is under tremendous strain. With major shows like Drupa and Print Pack having been postponed, technology provider companies are left with scarce platforms to showcase their latest offerings. Online platforms have been exploited to new levels to connect with industry as well as customers. “Recent trends have forced print convertors to revisit their cost and investments in technology which can maximize their productivity hence profitability. In this virtual online event, Komori will try and show some of its advance new lines of printing presses

providing cutting edge technological solution for printing in India thus making a difference between a qualifier and a winner,” says Sangam Khanna, Vice President, Komori India. Key speakers from Komori will be covering important aspects of Lithrone G 40 & GX 40 Advance. Komori India Sales & Service and the Management Team will be available to answer participants’ questions on the Brand New Komori – World’s Best ROI. “As we are entering into another decade with lots of uncertainty, Komori will ensure that we keep up with this change with constant innovation and upgraded technology. Komori

G40 & GX 40 Advance is one such step in this direction,” says Sangam Khanna. “Post Covid 19 has changed the dynamics and the needs of each one of our Print Convertors family and has put profits under stress for all. Addressing the core issues Komori will be there to talk to you on some of the inherent Komori technologies which will prove to be a game changer for our customers,” emphasizes Sangam Khanna. Registrations are open for the Komori India Online Event. Here’s the link for more information and registration of the event:https://www.komori.in/advance-online-event/

Heidelberg decides to sell PMA to Luxembourg-based Co. Heidelberg will retain its headquarters and representative office in rented premises in the PMA. Heidelberger Druckmaschinen AG (Heidelberg) continues to systematically implement its strategic agenda: As part of the planned site and structural optimization measures, the company is selling the Print Media Academy (PMA) in Heidelberg to a Luxembourg-based investment company. A corresponding purchase agreement has been signed. The sale paves the way for a new, forward-looking use of the building at a central location in the city. Heidelberg is achieving a purchase price in the low doubledigit million-euro range. As an agile, modern company, Heidelberg is committed to short distances and efficient use of space. This means that employees are as close together as possible at the central site in Wiesloch/

Walldorf. With this in mind, Heidelberg had already moved the few employees still working at PMA to Wiesloch/Walldorf in 2020. “For us, the sale of PMA is the next logical step on our agenda. We are aware that the sale has a signal effect: However, we will remain closely connected to the city as well as the region in the future. At the same time, we are convinced that the change of ownership will open up new, diverse perspectives for the city and the local people,” says Rainer Hundsdörfer, CEO of Heidelberger Druckmaschinen AG. “With the proceeds from the sale, we can once again strengthen our liquidity in the persistently challenging Covid 19 environment and further

increase our financial stability in the long term through future cost savings.” Heidelberg will retain its headquarters and representative office in rented premises in the PMA and will therefore continue to make company-relevant decisions in the city, including at committee meetings held there.

January 2021

Kansal Graphics opts for Kodak Trendsetter CtP Among the available options, Kodak CtP wins hands down as the first choice to equip the new state-of-the-art unit at Derabassi near Chandigarh. Hitesh Kansal, the owner of Kansal Graphics started his own business in 1994 after a brief stint with Technova for about a year and a half where he says he learnt the tricks of the trade. Starting with supply of printing chemicals from Newstech (Mumbai) to local printers in the tricity of Chandigarh, Mohali and Panchkula, Hitesh has travelled the spiralling road of success over the years. Along the way, he also dealt in supply of paper and other print related consumables too to the industry in the region with products from Technova as well as Huber.

The feature-packed Kodak Trendsetter can plot CtP plates from Kodak as well as other suppliers, is extremely power efficient, generates low heat, comes with proven Kodak quality and above all, is a perfect fit for Kansal Graphics for its high per hour plate output.

With the digital transformation happening at a breathtaking pace, in 2004, Hitesh took the plunge into prepress after taking over a running prepress unit in Chandigarh. In 2010 he upgraded the capabilities with a Technova Violet CtP to cater to the newspaper industry in the region. The unit later chiefly supplied plates to commercial and packaging printing presses that specifically needed long run plates. Before going in for the Violet CtP technology, Hitesh considered all the three options – Violet, Thermal and CtCP. He simply ruled out CtCP because the technology was in its nascent stage then. He rather wanted to opt for a tried and tested technology. He was already dealing with Technova

in his consumables business, and it was quite an effortless decision to choose them as their equipment supplier as well. “The UV plates required no baking whatsoever to reach the long runs as compared to the thermal those days,” Hitesh recounts the reason for selecting the UV CtP. Of course he faced a few hiccups in the initial days of installation; convincing customers to try and accept the new technology was an added challenge too. But things gradually stabilised and ran smooth for coming 8 years. In 2019, Hitesh felt the need of upgrading the CtP system whose production capabilities didn’t justify the demands of the market any more. The servicing was getting costlier as the machine aged. Considering all these factors, he decided to upgrade the equipment at his new setup at Derabassi near Chandigarh. The new state-of-the-art facility was set up at a location where a number of new printing units were being set up by old as well as new entrepreneurs. Now the hunt for a value for money yet sturdy system ended on the advanced CtP from Kodak. “CtCP was an available option but I was not very keen on investing in it especially because our existing customers were not much interested in these plates and hence the return on investment was at greater risk,” reasons Hitesh.

Key Notes : > In 2019, the need to upgrade their aging CtP system was felt by Kansal Graphics. > The hunt for a value for money yet sturdy system ended on the advanced Kodak’s Trendsetter CtP. > Proved a perfect match for being very robust which is especially of utmost importance to service providers like Kunal Graphics.

January 2021

Hitesh Kansal (L) with Karan of Kansal Graphics

pressideas/ commercial printing

Hitesh also considered Amsky from Technova before finally zeroing on Kodak Trendsetter, which won hands down as the first choice. In his own words, “The Kodak machine comes with many qualities. We all know Kodak as an international name of repute for plates as well as CtP, and for chemicals and consumables alike. The Trendsetter runs on much lesser power than its competitors do. Moreover, the per hour plate output perfectly suits our demand.” Mr. Natesh Puri, National Sales Manager - Packaging & Newspaper Segment at Eastman Kodak Company, who Hitesh built a nice rapport with during his Technova days, played a significant part in making up his mind for the Kodak machine. “During my study before finalising on the CtP system, I found that the Kodak CtP setup utilised almost half the power requirements than its nearest competitor. The heat generated by the competitive machine (and the processor) could only be managed by putting two aircons. My present Kodak CtP runs cool with a single installed aircon in the CtP room. The price of plates didn’t make much difference. More than anything else, I found the Kodak system very robust which is especially of utmost importance to service providers like us. We can’t afford delay in deliveries due to machine problems which can mean loss of customer and business. Many CtP devices in the market can do good for in-house needs of a printer but for a service provider, there is no match for a Kodak,” declares Hitesh. He emphasised upon the fact that the Kodak Trendsetter CtP they acquired is capable of plotting not only on Kodak plates but also on other CtP plates available in the market. “It is especially advantageous for a service provider to bank upon in case of an eventuality,” asserts Hitesh. Moreover he is also pleased with the fact that they are presently exploring possibilities of supplying process-less plates as an environment friendly aspect to his printer clientele. They have received a good response to this offering as of now. “It is our responsibility to look into the sustainability aspect as a gift to next generation if not anything else,” states Hitesh. “KODAK SQUARESPOT Imaging Technology is Kodak’s award-winning thermal imaging technology, which allows printers to image

Natesh Puri (L) Kodak, with Karan of Kansal Graphics

plates with the highest level of accuracy, stability, and reliability, while automatically compensating for real-world problems like temperature variation, failing lasers and aging chemistry,” explains Natesh Puri. He further adds that plates made of Aluminum, like many materials, expands and shrinks when exposed to changing temperature. Plates, especially remakes, made at different times under typical shop conditions can end up being imaged at different sizes, which leads to subsequent on-press problems like registration and colour shift. A 5°C change in plate temperature can cause dots to shift by ½ rosette. Automatic Temperature Compensation, a feature of SQUARESPOT Imaging Technology, enables accurate registration even with variations in ambient temperature. Two sensors in the engine measure the temperature, and firmware in the imaging engine makes adjustments and places the pixel in an adjusted location to compensate for the aluminum expansion of

the plate. “That is exactly why we say that Kodak’s is a perfect imaging system for an imperfect world,” Natesh concludes. Hitesh’s son Karan Kansal, who recently returned after his BBA course from Frazer University in Canada, is the driving force of the new unit. “Youngsters are the future of our industry and I find it extremely pleasing to see that Karan has taken up the work more seriously than I could have envisioned. His education and exposure to the western environment will surely benefit the unit in the long run,” observes Hiresh. “Karan’s contribution in carrying out a recent market survey in the area involving visiting our existing customers and printers in the Derabassi region was an impressive experience for our entire team,” adds Natesh. It is always a pleasure to see the younger generation taking over the reins from the older one and sustaining similar business philosophy and expanding on it.

Hitesh with CtP Plates stock

Multi-Bookbinding improves thread-sewn book quality and sets to zero return rate with 100% product integrity check Meccanotecnica asterPRO enables increased productivity, improved quality of sewn book, positive downstream operations for Multi-Bookbinding

“Having tight and compact book blocks that do not lose signatures during transport allows us to automatically feed the binder, instead of performing the operation manually and consequently increase the speed of the process and reduce the number of people involved.” - Yvon Sauvageau

Key Notes :

Multi-Bookbinding, also known as Multi-Reliure in Quebec, is one of the leading trade-bindery in Canada with over thirty years of experience in bookbinding, servicing printers in Canada, and the US. The company was founded in 1988 by Ms. Suzanne Ferron, who started her business specializing in the production of yearbooks and book repair. Over time, Multi-Bookbinding quickly grew to become Quebec’s premier bookbindery, positioning itself as a point of reference in the industrial production of books, especially for hardcovers. In 2007, following the death of the founder, the company was acquired by Yvon Sauvageau and a group of associates including the son of Ms Ferron, Patrick Pâquet. The new team brings unique skills in growth management, giving a strong impetus to the business, also through major investments in industrial machinery for bookbinding to increase productivity and efﬁciency. “In 2018 we have started the retooling process of the company with an investment of over 2 million dollars,” says Yvon Sauvageau, General Manager of the company, “Our ﬁnal goal is to automate every production process to minimize manual operations.”

Today Multi-Bookbinding has over 60 employees and a facility of 6.000 square meters (62.000 ft²) equipped with high-performance bookbinding machinery providing printers in Canada and the US with large production capacity and extensive experience in bookbinding techniques such as book sewing, perfect and Wire-O binding. There are about 7 million books produced per year, of which about 1 million are thread-sewn. Among the latter, coffee table books (high-quality books often full of photographs or images) and yearbooks (school annuals that record and commemorate the school year) stand out. What are yearbooks: Yearbooks, or annuals, are a type of book published annually by an educational institution to document, highlight and commemorate students and the activities carried out during the school year. These are books that favor images and photographs that show students and the activities and events in which they were involved. What are coffee table books: Coffee table books are books to be put on display, the content of which favors photographs and images, and which aim to

> One of the leading trade-bindery in Canada with over thirty years of experience in bookbinding opts asterPRO from Meccanotecnica. > Produces 7 million books per year; about 1 million are threadsewn of which coffee table books and yearbooks stand out. > Manages to reduce the annual ‘return’ of yearbooks from 85 books to 0, thanks to the two artiﬁcial vision systems equipped on the asterPRO among various other benefits.

January 2021

From the left: Mrs. Danielle Gendron (Lead Bindery Operator) and Mr. Yvon Sauvageau (General Manager of Multi-Bookbinding)

pressideas/ commercial printing

entertain those who browse through the pages. They are therefore high-quality books that must be ﬁnished with care.

Challenge “In 2019 we were in the middle of the retooling of the company and we wanted to increase our production capacity for threadsewn books,” says Yvon Sauvageau, “The need was also magniﬁed by the winning of a big contract for a coffee table book that was scheduled for production right in the middle of the yearbook season, a time in which thread-sewn production is close to saturation.”

Solution “We already had two book sewing machines of another manufacturer, but for this investment, we trusted Meccanotecnica Group and Manrico Caglioni (President of Book Automation, the U.S. company of the Group) for the importance to have a reliable and responsive after-sales service.” The decision went to the asterPRO, automatic book sewing machine, that incorporates all the cutting-edge technologies for book sewing, automatic features, and the latest GigaLynx vision systems for a complete integrity control system. The asterPRO purchased by Multi-Bookbinding is equipped with two GigaLynx artiﬁcial vision systems. The ﬁrst, located inside the loading station, checks the correct sequence of the gathered signatures, allowing the operator to intervene in the event of an error without rejecting

A coffee table book produced by Multi-Bookbinding for Imprimerie L’Empreinte with the title: “CN 100 ans à bâtir un héritage ensemble 1919-2019”. Number of pages: 306, dimensions: 11,25 x 12,00″, number of copies: 35.000

the book. The second, located inside the transport saddle, checks the correct opening of the signature, completing the integrity check before the book is sewn.

yearbooks which are immediately checked by the students and which has helped us to reduce complaints and the percentage of overprints for each order,” says Mr. Sauvageau.

Results “asterPRO increased our productivity considerably and improved the ﬁnal quality of the sewn book with the production of tighter blocks, also positively affecting downstream operations,” says Yvon Sauvageau, “Having tight and compact book blocks that do not lose signatures during transport allows us to automatically feed the binder, instead of performing the operation manually and consequently increase the speed of the process and reduce the number of people involved”.

“One last interesting element of asterPRO is linked to its attractive design and easy-touse software interface that makes it easier to ﬁnd new operators willing to work in the bookbinding department. Young people feel more attracted to the machine and more willing to work on it,” he concludes.

“Furthermore, thanks to the two artiﬁcial vision systems equipped on the asterPRO, we have also managed to reduce the annual ‘return’ of yearbooks from 85 books to 0. This is a very important beneﬁt, especially for Mr. Yvon Sauvageau (General Manager of Multi-Bookbinding)

Example of book block sewn by asterPRO

World Print Hub: An Open Platform for the Global Print Community WPH is a unique initiative by Mumbai Mudrak Sangh (MMS) & Cyber Alchemist. Tushar Dhote – Immediate Past President, MMS, Chairman and MD, Dhote Offset Technokrafts, who acted as an Advisor, gives details about the Project in an interview with PRESSIdeas.

“We wanted our portal to be very interactive. Our services of Print Doctor (Ask me anything – AMA) will be available to address issues of the members round the clock and gain the wisdom of the senior members. In short there are many people to guide you, advise you and help you in addressing your concerns.” – Tushar Dhote

Key Notes : > WPH is a common platform for the industry people to support each other towards future enhancements and augmentation in the digitalization of the industry. > Members to discuss, brainstorm, suggest and share their thoughts, experiences for the betterment of the industry. > Varied services to members include Online Streaming, Library, Learning, Groups creation, Job section, Marketplace, Print Doctor and Advisory etc.

January 2021

Speaking about the recent launch of World Print Hub, a unique initiative by MMS (Mumbai Mudrak Sangh), Mr. Tushar Dhote, Immediate Past President of MMS comments, “With the need to constantly challenge itself and as a service to the Industry, MMS decided to expand its wings and collaborated with Cyber Alchemist to create a portal www.worldprinthub.com or WPH in short.” World Print Hub Community is the Global Community of all constituents of the Industry – Printers, Trade Associations, Suppliers and Manufacturers, Thought leaders and Printing Enthusiasts. The Objective of the Community is to bring the industry together. “MMS has been at the forefront of providing yeomen service to the Print Industry. With a rich experience of 65 years behind it, MMS has always believed in innovating, implementing, integrating and invigorating fresh ideas and developments in the Print industry,” says Tushar.

Who can benefit from the portal? WPH is a common platform for the industry leaders and stakeholders to meet different constituents of the print, packaging and allied industries and

support each other towards future enhancements and augmentation in the digitalization of the industry. In order to benefit all the members of the print fraternity, the membership is kept open for all. Interested members can log into the portal and sign up for the membership. It is as simple as that. “Following the principle of laissez faire and an open platform we encourage members to discuss, brainstorm, suggest and share their thoughts, experiences for the betterment of the industry,” informs Tushar.

pressideas/ commercial printing

“The genesis of WPH,” continues Tushar, “is a very interesting story. During the course of a random conversation with Jeevan Bhingarkar, on the state of affairs of the Print Industry, it struck both of us that the industry is right now in a precarious position especially after the lockdown. Moreover, all these years print has not got its due share of credit as a major contributor to the economy though it is one common factor amongst all industries big or small. This set the ball rolling and from it the birth of World Print Hub took place. The idea received a unanimously enthusiastic response from all the progressive members of Mumbai Mudrak Sangh when it was put across to them and with the rich experience and guidance of Jeevan Bhingarkar of Cyber Alchemist, the idea was transformed into reality.” The portal is accessible to all printers from the nook and corner of the world. Hence it is not limited to printers in India but across the world. With such a wide reach, though it is the endeavour to provide services without any charges, for some specialised services a nominal charge would be levied. But the most important of all is that one has to become a member to avail the benefits.

Key WPH services to its members WPH would be offering different services to its members including Online Streaming, Library, Learning, Groups creation, Job section, Marketplace, Print Doctor and Advisory. In the Advisory Service, WPH would be putting together a global advisory group of experts in different subjects related to printing that can help member’s access

expertise in areas like technology, legal, commercial, taxation etc. Hence t is open to all print enthusiasts be it professionals, students or even a lay person. With features like creating profile, adding friends, forming groups, uploading pictures/ audios/videos, joining groups etc., it is just like a social networking site. Explaining what makes it different from various other platforms, Tushar says, “What distinguishes us from others and makes us unique is that this is the first and one of its kind platform for the print community. Social media and networking is the de rigueur norm today for everyone to connect and the kind of reach it has is unparalleled. A lot of thought went behind the creation of the portal with days and nights of discussions, endless research to come up with the portal.” “If you go through the various sections, you would be amazed to see the kind of content curated and made available. And let me tell you this is just at the tip of the iceberg. The kind of content and material we will keep on making available would be mind boggling. Freshness of content and stimulating of the mind is guaranteed and we can guarantee no one will be left disappointed,” emphasizes Tushar Dhote.

The Market Place of WPH – who and what would be buying and selling Marketplace section of the portal is a unique space where manufacturers and suppliers of print equipments and consumables can post their product information and seek

leads and even transact business. “Thus it would provide increased opportunities and commerce for the businesses. It is an open platform to all our members be it printers, manufacturers, vendors and dealers to advertise and transact their business,” says Tushar.

Attracting the best talents and training programs on demand “A major pain area for all printers is attracting the best talents in their respective organizations. We decided to address this by having a section for Jobs,” says Tushar explaining the Jobs section of the portal. Giving details of the Learning section, he says, “The kind of technological advances is so huge that it becomes difficult to catch up. Hence there is a need to constantly upgrade, innovate and adapt to these changes. Our Learning management system supports asynchronous learning where different training programs will be recorded and available to members on demand access. These topics range from technology to other peripherals like finance, costing, exports, marketing etc in short any and all those factors which help in running a successful business.” In addition to above services, there is the Library service which will be open to all members with easy access to the content. Moreover, the portal will also be providing Online streaming of communications on industry topics in the form of multimedia posts. The library offers a repository of knowledge which can crowd source interesting, informative and futuristic content.

January 2021

pressideas/ commercial printing

The Print Doctor will be available round the clock to address printers’ issues Printers are beset with a variety of problems but sometimes they are not aware how to tackle this or they may be a hesitant to take a second opinion. This is where ‘the Print Doctor’ of WPH steps in. Tushar explains, “Now this is very interesting. We wanted our portal to be very interactive. Our services of Print Doctor (Ask me anything – AMA) will be available to address issues of the members round the clock and gain the wisdom of the senior members. In short there are many people to guide you, advise you and help you in addressing your concerns.” The World Print Hub is a result of the partnership between Cyber Alchemist and MMS. According to Tushar Dhote, “Cyber Alchemist is the brain and MMS is the heart in this venture and together we both are working in tandem to make this a world class offering.” Another key player in the venture is Technova. Expressing his gratitude, Tushar says, “We are extremely thankful to Technova for their unflinching faith and support. We are blessed that none other than Pranavbhai showed faith in our venture. He was one of

our foremost supporters and his faith in WPH has led us to believe that we are on the right track. Technova are the industry leaders in consumables and their backing has made us stronger. They would be one of our Patron Members.” “We are not going to rest just by launching the portal. Our work starts now and the kind of support and faith the industry has shown us means we cannot let them down. We will keep on working, evolving, creating and presenting new content. Our responsibility is not just towards our printing fraternity in India but to the world,” declares Tushar.

Promises to be an evolving common unifying platform Since WPH is a joint venture between MMS and Cyber Alchemist, both would be managing the affairs in their respective domain areas. MMS Core team would be Jigar Satara (Chairman), Rahul Kulkarni (Co Chariman) and Tushar Dhote, who would monitor on a day to day basis. WPH has tied up with leading luminaries of print world and a global advisory group of experts in different subjects related to printing to help member’s access expertise in areas like technology, legal, commercial, taxation etc.

Promising to be always at the forefront of sharing knowledge and information, WPH assures to keep on evolving and come up with innovative methods to be connected with the WPH community. “There will be regular communication in the form of Print Digest,” avers Tushar as he concludes with these strong words, “I am sure – with the kind of feedback and encouragement we have got from the global print community – we will soon be able to blur the line between the global printers and become a common unifying platform for the print community.”

Automation to take care of shorter runs and lead times, Rajesh Nema Rajesh Nema of Pragati Graphics, shares his views on prevalent market conditions post lockdown.

Industry suffered immensely due to the pandemic especially post lockdown that was imposed in March 2020. There have been lot of changes – positive as well as negative – observed in consumption patterns, investment decisions and product demands etc. PRESSIdeas had a brief chat with Rajesh

January 2021

Nema, Pragati Graphics to share his views on the situation. “The industry working has become more systematic during and after the lockdown,” opines Rajesh Nema. “The situation is indeed improving and is back to about 85% of pre lockdown period,” he says.

“Pandemic or no pandemic, run lengths are becoming shorter and shorter and lead time given by customers is reducing day by day. There will be demand for smaller package sizes along with good demand for home cleaning materials,” emphasizes Rajesh.

Further speaking about the changes in demand and supply, he says, “Thanks to our esteemed suppliers, there has been no shortage of raw material so far. There has been pressure on finance as payments are coming very slowly. There has been slow demand in some FMCG while food products’ demand has gone up.”

No doubt, the industry is experiencing postponement of key decisions on investment and new installations and the impact is significant. On the other hand, efforts by customers and solutions providers to adapt to changed circumstances are reducing the effect to some extent. “My personal investment decisions have been postponed by a year and also the investment pattern has also changed. Now more automation will be required to take care of short runs and short lead time,” concludes Rajesh Nema.

He agrees that there has been a continuous change in product preferences impacting the printing, packaging and labeling industry. However, he avers that the changes have been despite the pandemic situation.

pressideas/ commercial printing

Shaping the Future of Books Webinar by Intergraf Intergraf is organising not one, but two events – Chapter 1 on 11 February and Chapter 2 is due to take place in-person at the Frankfurt Book Fair on 21 October 2021. Shaping the Future of Books, a webinar by Intergraf, will take place on Thursday 11 February 2021 at 11-12:30h (CET). Participants can hear about the latest developments in the European book market from the perspectives of printing and publishing, including the effects of the pandemic and exclusive market data from Smithers. The stage is set for this FREE webinar on Europe’s book market. Participants will first hear from Adam Page, Global Director Research and Reports at Smithers Information. Adam will present Smithers’ latest European book market data. Participants will then hear from two expert panellists – a printer and a publisher – moderated by book printing specialist and former Intergraf President Håvard Grjotheim. Panellists are: Rupert Smith, CEO of Halstan Printing and Peter Kraus vom Cleff, Managing Director and CFO of Rowohlt Verlag GmbH. Halstan is an international high-quality book

exclusive European Book Market Report, which will be presented in full at Chapter 2 in October.

printer and binder which specialises in producing sheet music, soft cover books, journals, educational textbooks, manuals and notebooks. Rupert will give the printer’s perspective. Peter Kraus vom Cleff is a book publisher based in Hamburg (Germany). Peter is also President of the Federation of European Publishers, Intergraf’s publishing counterpart in Brussels. Peter will give the publisher’s perspective.

Chapter 2 consists of conference. The 2021 edition of Shaping the Future of Print event is extra special because Intergraf is organising not one, but two events. Chapter 2 is due to take place in-person at the Frankfurt Book Fair on 21 October 2021. This event will showcase a larger collection of speakers and topics – including a more in-depth presentation on the European book market from Smithers. Participants of Chapter 2 will also receive a copy of Smithers’ exclusive European Book Market Report.

Shaping the Future of Print is supported by Intergraf’s market research partner Smithers, which will provide participants at Chapter 1 in February with a teaser to their

Registrations for Chapter 2 will open later in the year. Registrations for Chapter 1 can be done at: https://app.livestorm.co/intergraf/ shaping-the-future-of-books-2021

‘Printech Park Cluster’ in Harohalli The first sophisticated Printech Park Cluster was unveiled at the Harohalli Industrial Center in Ramanagar, Karnataka. The first sophisticated Printech Park Cluster was unveiled on January 20 at the Harohalli Industrial Center in Ramanagar district of the Karnataka state. Industry Minister Jagadish Shettar launched the program organized by the Karnataka State Printers Association. India ranks fourth in the world in the printing industry with over 3 lakh units in the country. Printech Park is an innovative experiment, the first in the country. It has invested over 100

crores in development projects and provided the best infrastructure. The printing center is located on 57 acres of land. It boasts the state-of-the-art machinery and equipment installed at a cost of Rs 27 crore. Jagdish Shettar said that Industrial Clusters will create more job opportunities. Speaking at the inauguration of the Printech Park Cluster and Common Facilities Centre at Harohalli Industrial Area, he said, “More and more clusters will avoid people migrating from one place to another in search of a job. Industrial clusters are starting up in different parts of the state and the first operational Printech Cluster has started in Harohalli, Ramanagar district today and this industry intends to do more work in a short time using modern printing machines.”

Dayaker Reddy Sripathi was with Printpack India Ipama at Harohalli Industrial Area during the inauguration of the Printech Park. He comments, “I am quite thrilled to attend in person and in my official capacity, this prestigious inauguration of Printech Park as well as Common Facilities Centre at Banagalore, especially in my first visit after 20th March 2020. I am sure that this inspiring and epoch making project at a cost of Rs.27 crores will stand as a beacon of light and hope in an otherwise virus infected and discouraging year gone by.” Printech Park Cluster has state-of-the-art Heidelberg Speedmaster CS 92 4+L, Four Colour Press with coater, Suprasetter A 106 CtP Equipment, Polar 115 PF Cutting Equipment and Stahlfolder CH 78 Folding Equipment.

January 2021

The first CorruFLEX oﬀ to a successful start THIMM Group thrilled about its CorruFLEX from Koenig & Bauer.

The CorruFLEX was designed and developed together with the high board line rotary die-cutter CorruCUT, and provides highperformance postprinting on corrugated board in the highest possible flexo quality.

The THIMM Group has successfully installed its first CorruFLEX from Koenig & Bauer. The new press started operating at the works in Sibiu in Romania at the end of last year, marking the fulfilment of a contract signed in December 2019. “By installing this HQPP flexo press, we are catering to the demand for high-quality packaging products on the East European market, and are broadening our portfolio of customer-oriented solutions,” says Michael Weber, head of corporate strategy and marketing for the THIMM Group. The first tests to evaluate quality and register accuracy were conducted on site by an external service provider. “We are more than satisfied with the results,” as Michael Weber continues. The new press will be primarily used for four-colour production on coated board.

CorruFLEX – high-quality flexopostprint on corrugated board

The basis of trust and professionalism that characterises the partnership between Koenig & Bauer and the THIMM Group allowed any delays to commissioning caused by the global COVID-19 pandemic to be kept to a minimum. Christoph Müller, member of the executive board of Koenig & Bauer AG: “We remain dedicated to pursuing our strategic path. All three of our new presses, the CorruJET, the CorruCUT and the CorruFLEX, have now been successfully placed on the market, and we will be stepping up our efforts to set the standard in this segment, too.”

For more than 200 years, Koenig & Bauer has been supporting printers with innovative technology, tailor-made processes and a wide array of services. The portfolio ranges from banknotes, via board, film, metal and glass packaging, through to book, display, coding, decor, magazine, advertising and newspaper printing. Sheetfed and webfed offset and flexo printing, waterless offset, intaglio, simultaneous perfecting and screen printing or digital inkjet – Koenig & Bauer is at home in virtually all printing processes and is the market leader in many of them.

The CorruFLEX was designed and developed together with the high board line rotary diecutter CorruCUT, and provides high-performance postprinting on corrugated board in the highest possible flexo quality. It stands out as a unique turnkey solution that combines the latest technologies and functions with straightforward and intuitive operation. The CorruFLEX boasts a multitude of unique features, such as a vacuum-belt feeder that operates without feed rollers, and an innovative anilox roller changing system. It can be operated either as a stand-alone solution or be integrated into a production line together with conventional flatbed die-cutters.

Key Notes : > Successfully primed for production; High degree of automation. > THIMM Group very pleased with its CorruFLEX– high-quality flexopostprinter. > The new press will be primarily used for four-colour production on coated board.

January 2021

The first CorruFLEX installed by Koenig & Bauer

pressideas/ commercial printing

INX International increases Technical Services for Commercial and Packaging printers INX International has enhanced all-encompassing slate of technical services offering to Commercial and Package printing customers. “In the past ink choice was little more than a passing thought. In recent years it has become more sophisticated and an important asset to the business community, especially with brand owners,” said Ron Deegan, Senior Vice President of Sales – North America for INX International Ink Co.

INX International Ink Co. has recently announced that it has increased its allencompassing slate of technical services that are available to commercial and package printing customers. It bodes well for those looking to take advantage of training and education, improvement in pressroom productivity and other significant measures.

“From pressroom assessments and press fingerprinting, to product selection and trial support with continuous improvement recommendations,” continued Deegan, “our technical team takes a proactive approach to service. Our structured mindset focuses on increased efficiencies and throughput, waste reduction, quality improvements, and lower applied costs.” One area Deegan believes that offers significant value is G7 Certification assistance. INX not only has certified IDEAlliance G7 experts on staff, but the allotment of resources available and approach in offering color management best practices sets INX apart from other ink manufacturers.

INX is one of the top leaders in the industry that provide essential support to customers. INX has knowledgeable ink experts who can help commercial and package printers navigate issues specifically related to ink. This includes G7 Certification assistance, quality improvement processes and practices, and troubleshooting support.

“Most corporate brands require printers to submit work to be graded for color and consistency. Combine this with more and more customers requiring printers to be G7 master printers before doing business with them, and you’ll understand the shift in our approach,” explained Deegan. “Our G7 methodology helps printers run a set of standards that is based on a gray

balance of Cyan, Magenta and Yellow, which builds your color palette when printing. The end result is we have the know-how to help printers reach color faster while reducing waste, reproduce jobs on different printing platforms, and match proofs across different print platforms.” All printers wanting to learn more about INX Technical Services support, including insights and information about equipment performance, pressroom productivity, and print job support, can get all the necessary information by visiting the INX International website or can as well download the Service Guide brochure. INX International Ink Co. is among the largest inks producers. It has full service subsidiaries in Europe and South America and is part of Sakata INX worldwide operations. The company offers a complete line of ink and coating solutions technology for commercial, packaging and digital applications. As a global manufacturer of inkjet inks, it provides a full palette of digital ink systems, advanced technologies and integrated services.

January 2021

Publishing industry reels under rising Newsprint cost Cost for paper used by newspaper and magazine publishers up 20% in a quarter. The jump of 20% in the cost of newsprint in the past three months has caused a great worry in the publishing industry already under immense pressure due to business slowdown due to various factors including COVID-19 related months of lockdown conditions. Cost of paper has seen a steep rise, prompting news publishers to urge the government for import duty waiver to help cut cost.

Newspapers and magazines were experiencing a steep fall in demand with the customers (readers) fearing and avoiding products – including newspapers and magazines – that could be potential carriers of virus. The industry was already facing hardships due to a slowing economy before the pandemic and was hit hard with this fall in readership. No amount of assurance including medical theories refuting transmission of virus through packaging materials, paper and newspapers or magazines, could bring the demand on track even after the lockdown restrictions got lifted, industry reports say. With about 3 million tonnes of manufacturing capacities either closed or converted to brown paper grades worldwide, drastic fall in supplies of newsprint was experienced causing the recent rise in cost of newsprint. This proved another blow to the already suffering industry struggling for survival. “Most newspapers have stopped sending the hard copies to the rural areas with readership of less than 50 copies, to reduce the distribution cost,” says L Adimoolam, President, Indian Newspaper Society (INS). In a representation to Finance Minister

January 2021

Nirmala Sitharaman, INS has suggested cutting customs on import of newsprints. They also want a fiscal stimulus package for the industry or raising tariffs of government advertisements by 50 per cent. “If working out a stimulus package for print media is difficult at this juncture, DAVP (Directorate of Advertising and Visual Publicity) may please consider releasing advertisement for all its departments to all publications with an increased tariff of 50 per cent, which would be highly helpful for the industry as a whole,” the INS representation said. It has also sought extension of the validity of RNI (Registrar of Newspapers for India) Circulation Certificates up to March 31, 2022, which will enable DAVP rates to remain the same till next year. It is estimated that the print media would take two-three years to recover from the current situation, the INS added. Many newspapers have shut down editions, reduced the number of pages and cut staff to cut costs. There are many small papers that have also been forced to close down due to the hard conditions. “Prices of newsprint have shot up by 20 per cent in the past three months. Another increase of 10-15 per cent is on the anvil next month which will severely impact the publishers,” said the INS in the memorandum. Domestic producers are severely under-stocked on their raw materials to supply adequate quantities, it added. Indian publishers highly depend on imported newsprint due to many factors including insufficient domestic capacity/output and poor quality. Moreover, leading domestic newsprint producers have already increased their prices by Rs 3,000 to Rs 4,000 per tonne. Requesting to remove 5 per cent customs duty, the INS said the tax would yield Rs 200 crore to the government exchequer in the next fiscal. “But, in view of the grim

situation, it would be a great relief for the print industry.” However, the Indian Newsprint Manufacturers Association (INMA), which represents the newsprint industry, has said enough capacity is available and the domestic industry is having full potential to provide unstinted support to print media. The domestic newsprint industry is facing the issue of under-utilisation of the installed capacity as more than 75 per cent market share of the newsprint has been captured by cheap imports and dumping in India by the foreign companies. The current domestic capacity of the newsprint industry is 2.2 million tonnes per annum (MTPA) and over 1.5 million tonnes is under-utilised due to continuous offloading of cheap imports. However, Adimoolam counter by saying, “Almost 100 per cent newsprints produced by the Indian manufactures are being consumed. Only the balance is imported.” “The Indian newsprint industry produces newsprints below 45 gsm and the most of the newspapers in India now use 40 gsm and 42.5 gsm,” he adds. The shift from 40 gsm to 45 gsm means creating a 12 per cent difference in the cost. Also, the newspaper industry uses high-speed machines for printing and the domestic newsprint has issues with that, Adimoolam said. The Indian newspaper industry required 2.5 MTPA and the domestic production is around 1 MTPA and the balance 1.5 MTPA is being imported by the publications.

pressideas/ newspaper

Digital Media India 2021 announced lead to increase in digital subscription and advertising revenues for many publishers worldwide. Digital Media India 2021 will bring in case studies of successful publishers from across the world who are sustaining this ‘corona-bump’ business opportunity, and will highlight the top trends for the year. Some of the topics of the conference include: The much awaited ‘Digital Media India’ Conference from WAN-IFRA, the World Association of News Publishers, is slated for 2-4 March 2021. In its 10th edition this year, the event will be organised virtually for the first time. It will discuss digital revenue and technology challenges for news publishers and provide strategic direction for driving the business this year.

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• While the COVID-19 pandemic disrupted almost every business, it also brought about a positive change in the reading habits of people. The consumption of content on digital platforms has increased and has

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Digital Innovation: What makes the difference and how to pivot to be a digital friendly news organisation Digital revenue: Managing the subscription and advertising revenues, finding the right mix Product strategy: How a product lead strategy helps better retention of subscribers Revenue ideas: Going beyond advertising, other ideas including content to commerce that help to ramp up revenue Technology: Using data to develop user experiences, best practices

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Technology: Cookies and privacy, how to maneuver the conundrum Digital transformation: Case studies of successful transformation of the business for digital growth And many more.

The conference timing will be 10 am - 12 pm and 3 pm - 5pm on all the three days.

South Asian Digital Media Awards 2020 The conference will also honour the winners of South Asian Digital Media Awards 2020 on 3 March afternoon. South Asian Digital Media Awards is the region’s prestigious competition recognising outstanding work done by news publishers in digital media. Twenty judges from across the globe have evaluated the entries in the ten categories of the competition and selected the winners. For regular programme update, please see http://events.wan-ifra.org/events/digitalmedia-india-2021.

WAN-IFRA: Media Freedom Programme for Sub-Saharan Africa WAN-IFRA will work with print and digital media organisations in Botswana, Kenya, Malawi, Rwanda, South Africa, Tanzania, Uganda, Zambia and Zimbabwe to improve the safety of journalists and the security of newsrooms, increase media-led advocacy around press freedom and gender-related issues, provide high-level business and editorial management support, and offer financial assistance to strengthen public interest reporting. The partnership builds on a previous threeyear strategic engagement with the Ministry (2015-2018) and complements WAN-IFRA’s existing programme engagements on the African continent through long-term collaborations with the Swedish International Development Cooperation Agency (Sida) and the ground-breaking Women In News programme, as well as the Norwegian Ministry of Foreign Affairs. “We are delighted to renew our partnership with the Ministry of Foreign Affairs of Denmark and to start work on this important new project with our colleagues across

Africa,” said WAN-IFRA CEO, Vincent Peyrègne. “The last 12 months have exacerbated an already difficult situation for media globally, and African newsrooms are no exception. Many are struggling to successfully transition towards a digital future, innovate their products to remain appealing to audiences, or strengthen their business and editorial competencies under such harsh financial conditions. Added to this, the safety of journalists and persistent threats to press freedom make supporting colleagues across the continent an urgent priority.” Over the coming months, WAN-IFRA will identify newsrooms and media partners who will be invited to participate in this new initiative. Drawing on its Women in News network, the organisation’s Media Freedom Committees in Africa, and a growing membership community, up to 25 organisations will be selected to benefit from the resources and opportunities provided by this new programme.

Over the course of the three-year project, WAN-IFRA will work with media partners to: • Assess their approach to safety, offering training and direct assistance to strengthen journalists’ knowledge and preparedness as well as organisational responses to threats; • Strengthen and build media-led advocacy networks and campaign on media freedom issues relevant to local journalists; • Tailor support to editorial and business development through training and mentoring; • Provide micro-grants to finance public interest reporting “It is an important year for media freedom in Africa, with the 30th anniversary of UNESCO’s pivotal Windhoek Declaration providing a necessary point of reflection to judge successes and understand the work still required to ensure a strong, independent press can flourish,” said WAN-IFRA Press Freedom Executive Director, Andrew Heslop.

January 2021

digital printing

Canon India: Helping customers ‘Do More’ for each investment Mr. Puneet Datta, Senior Director-PPP, Canon India, shares his experience with challenges of the pandemic, about innovative methods to serve customers in changed times and more. “As business today are undergoing turbulent times and in alignment with the market needs, we recently launched the latest addition to the imagePRESS series, the imagePRESS C165, which has been well received by our users.

Canon introduces new entry level production Printer to the imagePRESS series – imagePRESS C165 which is designed to meet the varied range of requirements of print shops, creative agencies as well as corporate offices.

Key Notes : > Lockdown provides immense learning though being full of challenges. > Staying connected with both customers and partners has been key for Canon India in this lockdown period. > imagePRESS Series yielded numerous installations across India before lockdown; continues to draw attention of the professional printing industry.

January 2021

The recent months have been tough for the global as well as the domestic industry. “At global level the markets in which Canon competes shrunk due to spread of COVID-19 in early parts of the year,” says Mr. Puneet Datta, Senior Director-PPP, Canon India, apprising PRESSIdeas of the changes and modifications adopted by Canon in the present significant altered environment. “Some of the markets recovered faster than expected in Q3 2020 and so globally Canon has modified its projections especially for profits thanks to the sales of full-size mirrorless cameras and inkjet printers for home segment. In India we saw similar trends. However the print volumes in our office printing space and commercial printing space have reduced significantly due to work from home adopted by majority of the large organisations and the continued lockdown of schools and colleges India. Though it was full of challenges, the present situation has also provided us with immense learning, which will always provide a framework to plan and execute our future business,” he adds. For Canon, staying connected with both their customers and partners has been key in this lockdown period. “We utilised our investments in technology and digital infrastructure to stay connected with our customers and partners to ensure business continuity. We assured our end customers and partners that we are in this together. Our service personnel continued to provide services to essential service providers during this tough time,” says Puneet. Canon’s service and support team did an incredible job during these times, as they went the extra mile to support the customers and ensured on-site services when required. Remote support by Canon engineers was also a delight for customers as it enabled them to operate without hiccups even in the challenging times. Canon strengthened their service and sales during the recent slower months. “Canon India operations are deeply entrenched into the length and breadth

of India. Our foothold is in various Indian cities with a strong customer base including Tier II & III Cities. Our flagship imagePRESS Series has yielded numerous installations across India before lockdown and continues to draw attention of the professional printing industry,” informs Puneet Datta. There was definitely an impact on the printing industry and sales of machines during lockdown. However, Canon saw good momentum again Q3 2020 onwards and saw good customer purchase execution happening in Q4 2020 as well.

pressideas/ digital

Adapting strategy to changed customer outlook The pandemic has changed the consumer outlook in many ways and one of their focus areas has been to ensure business continuity amidst the turbulent times. Adapting to this mindset, Canon’s strategy has been to help customers to ‘DO MORE’ from each investment and further aiding the growth of printing industry in India. In this line, they launched the new entry level production Printer to the imagePRESS series – imagePRESS C165. “The newly indroduced imagePRESS C165 is designed to meet the varied range of requirements, whether it is for print shops, creative agencies or corporate offices,” says Puneet. “As business today are undergoing turbulent times and in alignment with the market needs, we recently launched the latest addition to the imagePRESS series, the imagePRESS C165, which has been well received by our users. We will continue to partner with our customers to help them build their businesses with the use of state-of-theart technologies and offering them business efficiency and increased profitability. Further, we are slated to launch new Series of Production Printing Products in 2021 to meet the upcoming demand in Digital printing segments,” he further adds. With the exhibitions and shows postponing or getting cancelled due to the ongoing pandemic, it is a major setback for the printing industry, thinks Puneet. “However, with virtual events becoming the new norm now, we can expect relevant platforms to stay connected with industry peers and potential customers. While these platforms may not

have a similar impact as physical shows or exhibitions, but they will provide a good head start for sure,” he says. “In India however,” he opines, “virtual exhibitions have not fared that well due to various reasons. So we see that as India returns to normalcy, the exhibitions and road shows would start returning back albeit in smaller format.” As the virus continues to spread throughout the world at a rapid pace, Canon focuses on how swiftly they can continue with new installations ensuring complete safety and security. Soon after the lockdown, they continued with contingency planning that helped them built every link into the value chain to ensure survival. “Besides, post lockdown, the period has given us the opportunity to re-look at the entire communication and collaboration process which has helped us to continue our businesses remotely. All this time we have been constantly in touch with our consumers and partners helping them to adjust to the new ways around business. As Canon operates in diversified markets and segments, we have seen good growth in certain segments which has reduced the impact from the printing segment,” explains Puneet.

Coping with the ‘new normal’ – by adapting With COVID-19 continuing to cause uncertainty, Canon has adopted the concept of ‘new normal’ intensely across divisions. Their key strategy has been to focus towards resource optimization, and at the same time, to help businesses to look for operational efficiency, cost reduction, improved turnaround time and serviceability. “Besides,

technology infrastructure plays a pivotal role for organizations to adapt to the new work environment and Canon’s business solutions are well equipped to help in achieving the desired objectives effectively,” emphasises Puneet.

Consumer and market trends during the COVID period “As we know these are trying times and printing trends have always been different across various decades in the past. Now apart from technology, the adoption of said technology is different across geographies of the world and a lot of it is to do with the economy and IT advancement of the nation and the privacy laws prevailing in the said geography,” believes Puneet, and foresees, “Print technology that allows the user experience to be enriched and maybe blurs the boundary of print world and digital world will see far more adoption.” He observes that Sales & Marketing approach has undergone striking changeover in lockdown era. As customers were comparatively less accessible physically so Canon adapted quickly & used digital marketing medium to reach their customers. For instance, they set up a live demonstration infrastructure at CTEC, Noida for customers to have one on one demos on Canon products. “It has worked well so far, however in Printing Industry, customers are used to touch & feel characteristic of Printing substrates/ Products and this requires adaptation from Customers as well,” says Puneet. He thinks, post Lockdown, mix era of digital & traditional Sales & Marketing Tools will be adopted by marketer, as digital marketing is also developed as an alternate option to reach customers. “Our sales teams have started travelling and meeting customers and providing them support wherever needed. We have also launched various indigenously grown software solutions that can really help customers in this time of disruption,” reveals Puneet. He expects that our industry would be picking

January 2021

pressideas/ digital

up pace in the coming months as we emerge stronger from the pandemic. “We foresee that the consumption pattern especially in the FMCG segment will be strong driving force for the print industry. There will be a need to have faster turnarounds, less inventories, reduction in wastage of media and time, all of which could possibly lead to faster adoption and high demand of digital printing. Short run printing & localization of print requirements have also increased post COVID. Another key segment which will drive industry back to print requirement is Education, as we see School and Educational institutions gradually resuming in 2021. Collectively, this will bring Digital Printing requirement back to previous levels,” he says. Revenue and profits targets of almost every major brand have been certainly affected due to COVID-19 and operations of Canon in India have been no exception. “The economy of the whole world is badly impacted, and the spending habits of consumer and customers will evolve as the economic situation improves globally. As with every economic setback, the printing industry especially gets impacted the most. However, we have seen higher adoption of Digital printing and solutions post the economic turnaround and COVID-19 should not be an exception. We expect slow and gradual recovery in India,” says Puneet.

Novel ways - remote management, webinars etc. to cater to customer demands “In the past few months, our focus shifted early onto skilling up of our partners and staff. We immediately started using virtual trainings to our advantage and we could really skill up our ecosystem,” says Puneet on Canon’s adoption of novel ways to serve customers in changed times. They conducted a lot of webinars for their

January 2021

customers in various segments. They utilised technology to remotely support their consumers and customers. Besides, they created Online demonstration facility at their Technical Excellence Centre and used it extensively to demonstrate Canon products and technologies to the end customers. “This has helped the partners and the customers to gain confidence during these tough times,” he asserts. He sees confidence of the industry and customers building up in recent weeks. “From this month, post starting of the vaccination for essential personnel in India, positivity has started to creep in. This coupled with less cases of infections have infused confidence in consumers and customers to start getting back to normalcy. Also, people have learnt to live with new normal situation and now are certain that this pandemic may not get over soon, so they need to move on with their plans with safety. However, many corporates are still opting to ‘working from home’ scenario. We see situation is getting to normalcy slowly

and steadily. As per our estimate it will take another 6 months to come back to the new normal. If we have learnt something from this pandemic, it is that the situation could possibly never return to same old normal of pre-COVID era. There will a new normal for each business and that is the new normal that will be considered as the foundation from which growth strategies will be formed. Having said that, we strongly feel that digital printing will see boom in post covid era,” claims Puneet. In 2020, the printing industry has witnessed a substantial increase in the adoption of innovative workflow management solutions that can enhance and optimise print operations for businesses. Organizations are willing to empower users to quickly adapt to the increasing demand for fast and safe information access through an easy-tomanage workflow automations solution. “We at Canon are working consistently to come up with solutions and products to take our Print 4.0 vision to the next level in the years to come,” concludes Mr. Puneet Datta.

Budget Reaction on First Digital Budget 2021: Xerox India Leo Joseph, Managing Director, Xerox India shares his reaction on Union Budget 2021. “As expected, the core needs of the economy, coming out of a pandemic-hit year, take prominence in the Union Budget 2021. However, long-term, the budget focuses on the D in India – standing for both development and digitization. The progressive budget lays the roadmap for greater digitization in governance. A budget presented and disseminated in a digital format for the first time to a digital census

will pave the way for the government to serve citizens through technology and data more seamlessly. The promise of ‘minimum government, maximum governance’ can only be realized through greater investments in technology and focus on greater R&D and innovation – which the budget does.”— Leo Joseph, Managing Director, Xerox India. Xerox Holdings Corporation is a workplace

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EFI steers through crisis by proud technology prowess Samir Gulve, MD, EFI India, speaks about how the company deftly employed remote collaboration, management and monitoring technologies and managed the recent Covid-19 with their proud technology prowess. The global industry suffered tough times due to COVID-19 situation. Businesses shrank, revenues dwindled and consumption and capital expenditure got deferred. Samir Gulve, Managing Director - Electronics For Imaging (EFI India) shares his experience and the company’s business, strategy, changes in working and other things during the latest crisis. “The most impact is seen in equipment business due to capital expenditure oriented nature of this business,” says Samir Gulve. Businesses, he says, got adversely impacted. “The overall intensity of the impact is variable by geography. Software business has been relatively robust. Our business growth is trickling back since the lockdown got lifted. Customers are still leery to go aggressively after growth,” he adds. EFI, with creative use of technology, did a decent job of managing the service and sales during the past few slower months. Though Samir sees positive signs appearing across their business since the lockdown and other restrictions got eased out gradually, he finds it a bit early to speak about the extent of affairs picking pace. “Every crisis is also an opportunity; the

industry will have to innovate new ways to accomplish what once required significant face to face presence,” comments Samir on postponement of major industry shows. “We already see several examples of this in terms of remote demos and other means. I believe the industry will emerge stronger,” he avers. There have been some interesting consumer trends as well that Samir observed during the COVID period. “Certain industries related to packaging and printing related to Covid -19 materials did well as expected. We expect more focus on automation, remote diagnostics, monitoring and management in the future,” opines Samir. Managing the ‘new normal’ which is being considered the future for some time, in an efficient manner, EFI has adopted the changes quite well to navigate smoothly through the times. “We take pride in our technology prowess. We have managed the ‘new normal’ quite well – we have deftly employed remote collaboration, management and monitoring technologies,” explains Samir. Having learned to operate in highly resource constrained environment during this crisis, he is quite confident that this would hold them in good stead as things return to normal. “We will augment our traditional approach with what we learned during this challenging time and are confident that the hybrid approach will be the most effective going forward,” he continues.

technology company building and integrating software and hardware for enterprises large and small. As customers seek to manage information across digital and physical platforms, Xerox delivers a seamless, secure and sustainable experience. Whether inventing the copier, Ethernet, the laser printer or more, Xerox has long defined the modern work experience.

Samir distinctly states that EFI’s long term strategy remains more or less the same. However, he quickly adds that they would continue to focus on innovation, customer centricity, judicious acquisition opportunities and geographic expansion. EFI launches are mostly of global nature. They will be bringing several innovative products to market in 2021 as well, says Samir.

he says, The overall business did see headwinds and we had to tune our goals realistically. We are hitting these updated goals and expect a much better year in 2021.” EFI’s technology prowess and ability to quickly adapt to new conditions, keeps it going. Not only did they manage their customer interactions deftly, they leveraged the relative lull to get their customers to ramp up their skills. “Some of our training and certification programs saw thousands of active participants during this period,” discloses Samir. He is presently keeping his fingers crossed to speak definitely about the future turn of events or things getting normal. “It’s hard to predict especially given the nature of this crisis. The best way to navigate uncertain times is to make prudent use of capital and resources, be nimble and look at crisis as an opportunity to innovate expeditiously,” emphasises Samir with the concluding recommendation – “Attitude matters. Be cautiously optimistic. Use any down time to figure out and act on strategic initiatives that will ensure that you come out stronger.”

Speaking of their current year’s sales targets,

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digital printing

Xerox reveals Suite of Production Print Innovations Addressing industry demand, 9 new products and features focus on boosting productivity and profit for print providers. Strengthening its position as a leading innovation provider in the production color market, Xerox unveiled 9 innovations including products and features focusing on boosting productivity and profit for print providers. At a virtual event attended by partners and clients around the world, Xerox unveiled the following innovations: •

•

Xerox announced a suite of production print innovations including new presses, technology enhancements for existing printers as well as artificial intelligence and automation features that aid speed and productivity.

Key Notes : > Print enhancement is the fastest-growing segment in the industry. > Xerox brings the latest innovation to its customers in India to help them expand their business. > “With the launch of our new technology and features, the capabilities and profit potential of the existing devices would be further expanded.” - Vineet Gehani

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• •

•

A Color Accelerator module for Baltoro, expanding inkjet applications and adding inksaving automation Addition of fluorescent pink to the Iridesse Production Press, enhancing its metallics, white and clear color palette Two new printers capable of higher volumes, more media and extended color options in the Versant family Two Xerox Nuvera print speed upgrades that best competition AI-enabled media manager software that enables high-quality images with minimal set-up and staff time Automated workflow updates to seamlessly print embellishments with FreeFlow Core 6.0

Digital print enhancements increase profitability, delivering higher margins and allowing print customers to expand into new areas. According to Keypoint Intelligence, digital print enhancement is expected to generate $25 billion a year and can

increase a printers’ profit by 50 to 400 percent. By making it easier, customizable and faster to produce these pages, Xerox technology provides multiple entry options for customers to expand their business and increase profit. “Currently, print enhancement is the fastest-growing segment in the industry and Xerox is committed to bring the latest innovation to its customers in India to help them expand their business,” said Vineet Gehani, Director - Technology and Channels, Xerox India, “With the launch of our new technology and features, the capabilities and profit potential of the existing devices would be further expanded. Our customers would certainly benefit from the new presses being introduced that would help cater to the demand of higher volume, extended media and color palettes. Our constant endeavour towards innovation and improvement is the reason Xerox remains on top in the production print market.”

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Xerox Color Accelerator for Baltoro The Xerox Baltoro High Fusion Inkjet Press platform, which Xerox says, is the No. 1 in the B3 cut-sheet inkjet market, now has a field-upgradable module that expands its range. The Xerox Color Accelerator for Xerox Baltoro HF Inkjet Press enables increased print quality, expanded media options and automation to make inkjet printing viable for lucrative applications such as direct mail, postcards and catalogues. With intelligent automation, Baltoro uses 50% less ink than competitor presses to purge inkjet heads, increasing uptime and productivity while delivering consistent, reliable quality, the company claims. Introduced last year, Baltoro is redefining the inkjet market. At a fraction of the size, weight and power consumption of many competitive presses, Baltoro offers a lower total cost of ownership (TCO) while being a uniquely scalable and customizable platform.

Fluorescent Pink for Iridesse Xerox has a magnificent broad colour capability and Beyond CMYK offerings across portfolios. It offers an extremely wide range of colours, embellishments, mixed metallics, extended gamut, media options and single-pass digital enhancement technology. The Xerox Iridesse Production Press is adding fluorescent pink specialty dry ink option to its existing Beyond CMYK palette of gold, silver, white and clear. These embellishments allow print providers to differentiate and offer their clients eye-

popping designs and enhancements.

Two New Versants Xerox is expanding its Versant family of presses with two new machines that support wider media options and add automation features that reduce staffing needs and setup time. The Xerox Versant 280 Press, a midproduction press, provides added value with thicker stock media options (400 GSM) for applications such as business cards. With the All Stocks at Rated Speed (ASRS) option, the Versant 280 offers high-end fast speeds especially while printing heavy stocks. Customers can print a million specialty colours using an Adaptive CMYK+ kit that leverages white, gold, silver, clear and fluorescents, unique to Xerox in this class of products.

settings. Users simply scan a barcode, place the paper in a tray, and use the set-up wizard to walk through optimizing the system for that application. FreeFlow Core 6.0 automates the process of preparing a file to print and now includes the application of Beyond CMYK enhancements. FreeFlow Core uses pre-built workflows to seamlessly apply embellishments such as gold, silver, white, clear and fluorescents without changing the source file. •

• The Xerox Versant 4100 Press, handles higher volumes and heavier production loads than the Versant 280, bringing more jobs in-house by reducing set-up time and printing on more media types. The 4100 also handles thicker paper stocks, up to 400 GSM. Automated stock management saves time and reduces human error.

• •

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Technology-Driven Efficiencies AI-enabled media manager software Predict PrintMedia Manager Software is included with the new Versant 4100 and can be added to Iridesse. By using artificial intelligence, the software automatically identifies the media being used and provides the correct press

•

XeroxColor Accelerator for Xerox Baltoro HF Inkjet Press - Current Baltoro customers will be able to order Color Accelerator beginning in 2021. New Baltoro customers will be able to place orders for Color Accelerator starting December 15 with installs expected to begin in Q1 2021. The Xerox Nuvera 157 MX Production System and Xerox Nuvera 314 MX Perfecting Production System – order taking and availability December 1, 2020. The Xerox Versant 280 is available now. The Xerox Versant 4100with PredictPrint Media Manager Software is available now Iridesse pink specialty dry ink option and the PredictPrint Media Manager Software option are available for order taking December 1, 2020 and availability beginning March 1, 2021. The XLS Automatic Feeding Kit option for Iridesse is available immediately worldwide.

January 2021

Mouvent Cluster: Opening a new chapter for label production BOBST Digital Printing – Scaling up the Business – a true story which will shape the future of the label world. It all started with a clear vision and firm convictions. In printing and converting machinery, the best products are the ones with the least number of moving parts – the best industrial design has the simplest architecture and enables an evolution of technology. Based on these principles and after four years, the Bobst Group is ready to open a new chapter in the label industry delivering quality, productivity and the best economics with no trade-off.

BOBST Mouvent Cluster Technology combines high quality with high speed at levels never achieved before. Know how in a single 8-hour shift with just 1 operator, a total of 21 wide-ranging jobs were easily achieved. In total, 13 x 2,000-meter rolls were used, totaling 26 kilometers of substrates and delivering nearly 1.3 million labels.

BOBST did not participate in the first digital wave. But then, back in 2017, the digital printing Competence Center of BOBST was created. The intent was to explore and deliver the next innovations to transform packaging production. A new revolutionary Mouvent Cluster has been designed over the last three years and is now deployed in three commercially available digital label presses – the Mouvent LB701-UV, the Mouvent LB702-UV and the BOBST MASTER DM5. It took us three years from the idea to the final product and this was worth the time and investment.

> It is now deployed in three commercially available digital label presses – the Mouvent LB701-UV, the Mouvent LB702UV and the BOBST MASTER DM5.

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• •

Combining quality and productivity

BOBST quality is based on: •

Colour Consistency

The new solutions will help label converters to address major pain points.

Key Notes :

> A new revolutionary Mouvent Cluster has been designed over the last three years.

•

million drops per second Ink conditioning layer where each individual printhead ink supply is close to the printhead Fully automated flow regulation control for each printhead ensuring consistent print at high speeds Mechanical layer and individual control of each printhead to ensure best alignment In addition, with its oneINSPECTION technology, BOBST offers a unique digital visual control system to ensure that all labels are delivered with the highest and most consistent quality from the first to the last one, for any jobs and with any operator.

If you are using 4 or 6 colours or if you are using white or special inks, Mouvent Cluster Technology combines high quality with high speed at levels never achieved before. To further support its claim, BOBST conducted a real-life test. In a single 8-hour shift with just 1 operator, it easily achieved a total of 21 separated jobs using 4 to 6 colours (some with white ink) on 4 different substrates (PP, PPE, transparent and metallized). You can see full details of the jobs in this article. In total, 13 x 2,000-meter rolls were used, totaling 26 kilometers of substrates and delivering nearly 1.3 million labels.

Quality – MouventTM Cluster Technology

> In 2017, BOBST created the digital printing Competence Center to explore and deliver the next innovations to transform packaging production.

•

4 Fuji Samba Printheads capable of printing native 1200x1200 dpi up to 100m/min State-of-the-art electronic layer driving the

Colour consistency during job length, job repeats and between different machines and sites, is one of the

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major challenges in both conventional and digital printing. BOBST oneECG technology utilizes advanced colorimetry technics to analyze and digitize colour information. Digital colour information is stored as reference and recalled during production request. Sophisticated colour algorithms will assign the colour information for up to 6 primary colours delivering up to 85% of the colour gamut with colour uniformity, up to 100 meters a minute. Digital colour information makes repeat jobs easy to manage and colour consistency across the entire job production is guaranteed by manual colour sampling or even with a fully automated visual inspection system for advance production lines. BOBST oneECG is offering a unique colour language that can drive both digital and conventional colour, thus bridging the gap of moving jobs easily between the two printing technologies and enabling seamless brand experience across all BOBST printing platforms.

Inks and white ink Inks are inherent to digital printing. While we all understand that ink has interactions with the substrate, it has major implications with the print heads, the related electronics and the software required to guarantee color consistency. For decades white printing was almost taboo for digital. There is a perception that white is the flexo premise. This was partially true – the opacity and the cost in digital were indeed not matching expectations for a while. It took some time to deliver a solution and now BOBST delivers white ink at 70% opacity at up to 45 meters a minute and this is a world record in digital printing. All the Bobst Group inks are a unique formula to deliver the best results but more importantly to ensure the best TCO. The economics of digital printing are a sensitive topic for all converters, and BOBST took the decision to manage it proactively.

be amazed by the cost savings they can generate on jobs that they would normally put on a flexo press. The new Bobst Group inks are designed for inkjet being a mainstream technology and not for niche applications.

The Bobst Group has 6 dedicated salespeople in Western Europe and USA. They are also expanding their presence as the demand for label digital printing is growing in RSA, Baltics, Brazil, NZ & Australia.

The most complete portfolio

Besides, four Demonstration Centers: Mex (Switzerland), Barcelona (Spain), Firenze (Italy) and Atlanta (USA) deliver personalized virtual demonstrations on request accommodating customer needs, time zones and languages.

Unlike many suppliers, the Bobst Group can rely on all technologies: Flexo, All-In-One and Digital. Without pushing one technology versus another – BOBST has offered solutions to optimize the entire production floor. The recently announced BOBST MASTER DM5, combining flexo units and the Digital Mouvent Technology print engine, is probably the best label press on the market, delivering all type of labels from the PDF to final rolls. Prime, print, embellish, cut – All-inOne, All-in-Line. It shows that technology will co-exist and that the customer needs will be met using the most appropriate technology.

Sales & Service Organization To promote their innovative label solutions in an effective manner, BOBST focuses on few countries with a dedicated sales force and the proper service organization. The focus will help clients to embark on the digitalization of mainstream label production.

BOBST closed 2020 with more than 20 presses sold. Some customers have multiple presses and are discovering that they can now do things previously not possible. In 2021 BOBST plans to scale up the business further and believes that they are at the tipping point for a new chapter in the label industry to be written. Offering a wide product portfolio across Flexo, All-in-One and Digital platforms, the Bobst Group is among the leaders in setting standards in speed, quality and costs. With the state-of-the-art technology, BOBST is ‘ready to shape the future of label production’.

TCO The rise of digital has been accomplished in 3 steps: first, digital had to deliver quality. Then, digital had to meet the expected productivity to compete with conventional technologies. Finally, digital had to deliver the proper TCO to again deliver against customer expectations. BOBST has worked on these 3 elements and is now leading on the 3 categories. Users can load all their short runs and even long ones and will

January 2021

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Gallus to remain with Heidelberg Owing to nonpayment of purchase price, Heidelberg to assert its rights in Gallus Group and benpac holding ag deal. Gallus Group continues realignment under Heidelberg umbrella. Heidelberg continues to press ahead with transformation program.

The sale of the Gallus Group by Heidelberger Druckmaschinen AG (Heidelberg) to the Swiss company benpac holding ag has not been completed. benpac holding ag did not make the purchase price payment of EUR 120 million agreed at the closing of January 29, 2021, although all the necessary conditions were met. Heidelberg had to assume until the very end that the transaction would be completed successfully. Heidelberg will assert its rights. The five sites and around 430 employees of the Gallus Group will remain with Heidelberg. Nothing will change for Gallus customers. Heidelberg will continue to handle sales and service for the Gallus portfolio and their personal contacts will remain the same. Heidelberg will now be examining various options for the corporate future of Gallus. In any case, Gallus will continue on its path to boosting operating performance: With an independent setup and specific focus on its

flexographic printing market, Gallus made good operational progress last year under the Heidelberg umbrella.

generate proceeds in the mid-double-digit million euro range from the transactions completed in December 2020 alone.

Irrespective of the Gallus transaction, which has not been completed, Heidelberg is already benefiting considerably from the transformation program launched in the current 2020/21 financial year to further stabilize the company financially in the challenging COVID-19 environment and to align it in a future-proof manner in its profitable core business. Since March 2020, net debt has been reduced by more than EUR 250 million from a peak of EUR 390 million, and liquidity has been improved by around EUR 450 million. As a result of the accelerated M&A program, Heidelberg will

The market remains challenging due to the currently worsening Covid 19 situation. Heidelberg is therefore systematically continuing its transformation course with the measures initiated for this purpose in order to create further financial scope. In operational terms, the third quarter of the current financial year saw a continuation of the upward trend in sales and incoming orders that has been ongoing since May 2020. Heidelberg continues to expect to achieve its targets for financial year 2020/21 (ending March 31, 2021).

NOVA by OMET: Represents a new frontier for customer assistance both voice and chat, the App allows the company’ service to operate with maximum effectiveness and timeliness.

OMET’s new NOVA App answers Virtual Access. The new multi-language OMET App is OMET’s innovative remote service and remote installation application. It was developed just before the pandemic and tested with excellent results during the lockdowns of this difficult 2020. Able of instant translation in 64 languages,

January 2021

Strongly desired by the Sales Director Marco Calcagni and by the Technical Assistance Manager Antonio Muraca, NOVA represents a new frontier for OMET’s customer assistance. It is managed directly from OMET offices, allowing the OMET technicians to work in the customer’s virtual reality and to guide the local staff over the needed operations with the utmost precision for solving the problem. “What distinguishes this App from the others is the instant translation and the ease of customer interaction. Thanks to NOVA, over the recent months we have been able to solve customers’ requests in

all continents without the physical presence of our technicians. We managed to carry out maintenance and complete replacement of machine parts, virtually guiding the staff on site,” explains Antonio Muraca, OMET Assistance Manager. “We already had the opportunity to successfully test the App during the lockdown and we think NOVA will be the protagonist in the future also for remote installations carried out by local collaborators.” The NOVA app is available from online stores (both Android and iOS). Starting from 2021 it will be included in sales contracts. It is suitable for any OMET machine. To use it, all a user needs is a smartphone or a tablet.

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Bellissima DMS now available in India Digiflex appointed as latest Bellissima DMS trade shop member. Prepress company Hamillroad Software has appointed Digiflex, one of India’s leading flexographic plate-making companies, to take its Bellissima DMS screening to market. Digiflex, a leading flexographic platemaker based in Hyderabad, India, has a mission to continuously improve its business processes and productivity; equipping its clients with the most up to date technology. Muralidhar Nalli, Digiflex CEO, comments: “When we decide to invest in the latest technology and equipment, we research the market to offer something new that gives our customers and us a unique selling proposition. From day one, we developed a customer-focused culture within the business; we listen to the needs of the market and look to address the challenges with technology and people. The Indian market is rich in rotogravure printing for flexible packaging. Still, as brands and printers look to adopt more environmentally friendly and cost-effective approaches, flexographic printing is seen as the preferred printing application to address these concerns.” “We have seen many Bellissima print samples, from promotional to production pieces, and they are photographic quality prints. We lead the India print market in redefining flexo plate and print quality – Bellissima gives our customers and us an economic and competitive advantage over rotogravure. We are very excited about the future by introducing this technology,” he adds.

good fit with Bellissima. They have a clear understanding of where technology meets the market’s needs and are very proactive in their approach. We expect them to be very successful in India.”

packaging run completed on just one set of MacDermid LUX ITP 60 plates. Our mission is to continue building on this and make Bellissima the cost effect Ultra-HD flexo print solution for all flexible packaging.”

“Brand owners are looking for a nocompromise solution to replace gravure, and since its launch in 2017, Bellissima has replaced gravure production jobs globally. We’re also seeing users exploit Bellissima’s long-run capabilities in anger, with a 2.0 million linear meters wide web flexible

Cambridge headquartered Hamillroad Software is a global supplier of software solutions for the prepress industry. It specializes in Digitally Modulated Screening, which provides high quality screening technology for Lithographic (Auraia DMS) and Flexographic (Bellissima DMS) printing.

Pierre Hammond, Commercial Director at Hamillroad, said: “The team at Digifex are a

January 2021

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NBG to represent Huayang CI flexo presses in India NBG will be the partner for Huayang in India for their complete range of CI Flexo presses. Printing and packaging machines supplier NBG Printographic machinery company, with more than 2500 installations across India and exported to more than 30 countries, has tied up with Xi’an Aerospace-Huayang Mechanical & Electrical Equipment (a part of China Aerospace Science and Technology Corporation). Huayang is a renowned player in the field of CI Flexo printing (HY Flexo) machines with more than 100 installations across the world.

Flexo printing solutions for customers in the printing and packaging field. Huayang is the largest CI Flexo Printing Machine manufacturer in China with a strong capacity for R&D (120 engineers,) production (410 technicians) and annual sales of over USD 100 Million. So far Huayang has supplied CI Flexo Printing Machines to over 30 countries including UK, Poland, Canada, Mexico, Costa Rica, Jordan, Qatar, Morocco, Tunisia, Japan, Thailand, Vietnam & India.

NBG will be the partner for Huayang in India for their complete range of CI Flexo presses and will be providing technical support to customers from Sales and Service.

CI Flexo Presses by Huayang are in operation with some of the well-known printing companies worldwide such as International Paper, 3M, Tokuyama, APP, Box Pak & Brewster. Nitin Garg, Director of NBG says, “Xi’an Aerospace Huayang is a market leader in China for CI Flexo Presses with machines in production with some of the world renowned companies. We are glad to partner with them for India as they are committed to India market. Their presses are built to international standards and at the same time, are very competitively priced.”

HY Flexo brand with its wide range of models suiting specific needs of today’s versatile packaging industry can print on wide range of substrates like plastic packaging, breathable film, non-woven fabric, paper, board, paper cup material, and textile materials. With run-speeds up to 450 MPM and customisation as required, HY Flexo by NBG and Huayang will offer cost effective CI

Calendar by DuPont shows Flexo power DuPont teams up with iTek Packz and Veepee Graphics for attractive desk calendars printed by Flexo. Following the success of previous editions of desk calendars printed by Flexography printing process, DuPont Image Solutions India business teamed up with its prepress partner, Veepee Graphic Solutions, and printer/convertor, iTek Packz, on the calendar project for 2021. The calendar has become an opportunity to showcase quality and capabilities of Flexo printing process in a segment predominantly ruled by Offset.

would complement the dance forms without compromising on their look and feel.

This time, the team took upon the challenge to print calendars with even more creative design concept. 2021 calendar theme is ‘Dances of the World’. Dance is a form of self-expression and an art form that unifies people from different cultures and beliefs, resonating happiness and freedom. Calendar images were chosen based on aesthetics, expressions of the dancers and details with possibilities of different embellishments that

A leading Offset printer of the region was very impressed when he saw the latest DuPont calendar. “It is a testimony to the fact that Flexographic printing is setting ever higher standards in quality of printing,” says Mr.Vineet Gupta of Peacock Prints Pvt. Ltd. “Days are gone when Flexo quality was considered as ‘not even near to Offset’; this product proves otherwise. The value additions and embellishments incorporated

January 2021

The calendars have been printed with DuPont Cyrel FAST thermal (solvent-less) process. The results have come out really well to highlight the USP of flexo technology to compete in mono carton/board printing segment, opening new opportunities for flexo application.

in the product are thoroughly impressive. Moreover, the flexibility to print on different substrates is an added advantage of Flexography,” he explains. DuPont, along with VeePee and iTek once again proves that the quality of Flexo is not just ‘comparable’, but in certain cases, even ‘better’ than Offset.

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YesGo inaugurates its Premedia Unit SGO SGO Premedia is yet another innovative venture by YesGo after successful launch of various branches and India’s first employment portal for printing and packaging industry.

YesGo has launched its Premedia Venture SGO on 10th January 2021 at a Chennai event that took place at Hotel Crown Plaza. The launch of SGO – Bring Life To Your Brand – was inaugurated by Chief Guest Mr. T. P. Jain Managing Director Monotech along with Guest of Honor Mr. AMSG Ashokan – Managing Director Arasan Ganeshan Group Of Industries and Guest of Honor Mr. Alan Barretto – Managing Director Nilpeter India. YesGo, after the successful launch of its Delhi, Bangalore and Mumbai branches and India’s first employment portal for printing and packaging industry – My Print Career e-Tabloid – has launched yet another innovative venture – SGO premedia. SGO is the first India-based Premedia and Prepress house that not only takes up the challenge to maintaining and strengthening brands image across the variants but is also an endeavour to optimize the brand, bringing more prominence to the voice of each brand with Indian manpower and management while endorsing true Indian values in the organization.

The Inauguration witnessed confluence of some of the top industry veterans along with presence of YesGo & SGO Team. The evening was presented by Ms. Rakhi Das, Business Development Manager, YesGo along with Ms. NR Ishitha – daughter of Mr. Nizamappas. Venkatesh Govindarajulu, Director – Operations & RL S Director – presented technical features in depth, in-line with the brand requirements. He explained how SGO can cater to the major classification in terms of corporate, employees and other premedia companies.

Vote of Thanks was presented by Mr. Nizamappas. SGO premedia has been crafted as a part of YesGo’s assurance of 360-degree solutions provider in packaging and printing needs as well as to offer a local and most cost effective premedia services equipped with in-house solutions – skilled manpower, high-end infrastructure like Esko, end-to-end workflow automation to deliver a most cost-effective operations for premedia needs at the door stop. SGO also aims to remove dependency on outsourcing and encouraging voice for local; a truly make in India Initiative to meet the growing industry needs.

Highlight of the inauguration was its unique invitation which was inspired from Tanjavur Dancing Dolls –Which never falls down. The Concept disseminate SGO’s strong competency and emphasises its all-weather service where perfection across the channels and verticals stands firm come what may. It’s an invitation “to partner with an all weather sway to empower your brand”. Team SGO is headed by Mr. Nizamappas – Founder & CEO, Mr. Venkatesh – Director Operations and Ms. Ramalakshmi Nizam – Director Technical.

January 2021

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Lake Image appoints two BDM to accelerate growth Lake Image Systems appoints two Business Development Managers – Maarten Ramback & Kendrick Tan Kok.

Lake Image Systems, provider of print quality inspection, variable data verification and integrity management solutions for the label, packaging and commercial print environments, has announced the appointments of Maarten Rambach and Kendrick Tan Kok Leong as Regional Business Development Managers. These appointments come on the heels of Lake Image Systems’ acquisition (announced in July 2020) by Domino Printing Sciences, and are in line with the firm’s strategy to strengthen its presence in Europe and Asia Pacific. Spanning over 20 years, Kendrick is a seasoned professional in both Digital Imaging Solution and Healthcare Imaging, and has experience in Sales, Marketing and Business Development. He holds an MBA with a strong technical background in printing, manufacturing & engineering, and has worked for a diverse range of companies in Asia Pacific which include Kodak, Canon, TRUMPF and most recently Barco. Kendrick has built up many valuable relationships with customers and has a strong track record in B2B technology solutions sales. He is based in Lake Image’s Singapore office and will be responsible for accelerating its sales growth in the Asia Pacific region. Maarten strengthens Lake’s European Sales team, and brings valuable business development expertise to capitalise on the continued business growth in its European markets. Maarten brings a unique blend of solution sales and technical skills in factory and process automation systems, gained at Nspyre (now Altran) and Turck BV (a subsidiary of Hans Turck GmbH & Co. KG). Based in The Netherlands, Maarten is focused on identifying new market opportunities, and strengthening customer and business relationships within Lake Image’s expanding Central and Southern European operations.

January 2021

“Kendrick and Maarten’s proven track record in business development and in-depth industry knowledge of their respective territories, will undoubtedly uncover new inspection opportunities for us and accelerate our growth and accomplishments within our expanding global markets,” said Paul Stinson, Sales Director at Lake Image Systems. “Attracting these high calibre sales professionals into the business is a great endorsement of our strategy and ambition, and both will be a huge asset to the team, giving us the ability to better serve our customers.”

By reading and processing the variable data now commonplace on many printed items, Lake Image Systems’ solutions inspect, verify, track and report on billions of documents, labels, plastic cards and packages daily using codes such as OCR, barcodes, 2D codes, QR codes and many more to detect print errors, identify & track items, secure products and protect brands and consumers. With over 4,000 systems worldwide they automate print inspection processes, in order to increase throughput and productivity, minimize waste and mitigate business risks for their clients.

CAMIS announces SleeveMaster Auto ‘Hands Free’ automatic flexographic plate mounting solution for mid to CAMIS S.r.l. has announced the new CAMIS SleeveMaster Auto (SMA), a “hands free” automatic flexographic plate mounting solution for mid to wide web flexographic printers. “Built around CAMIS’s flexo industry 4.0 platform the SMA continues on our quest of achieving maximum process and machine reliability as witnessed by all our clients with over many hundred CAMIS Irisleeve installations all over the world,” says Davide Pesenti, CAMIS Managing Director. The CAMIS SMA is designed to be as simple and easy to use as the CAMIS Irisleeve HD, at the same time, it provides the technological

progress that the industry currently demands. The SMA has several unique features that allow even used & demounted plates to be automatically registered and applied “hands free”, whilst its new “Double Decker” HD camera systems combined with the machine’s software and hardware features, allows the SMA to continuously track and actively eliminate the start upskew even over the longest print repeats. A brand new HMI touch screen with CAMIS Flexo 4.0 facility allows new and existing jobs to be either uploaded or preselected. Operators can scan EAN code equipped job sheet and the machine will gather the job

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Highcon and EFI announce global partnership - to offer customers an integrated, end-to-end business productivity and workflow solution. able to integrate with the EFI MarketDirect PackCentral online customer ordering portal and EFI Auto-Count 4D software, which automatically collects accurate, up-to-theminute production data for digital presses and cutting devices.

Highcon Systems and EFI have entered into a global partnership agreement. With a common group of core customers, together with EFI’s ability to deliver industry-focused ERP software solutions, the goal is to offer customers an integrated, end-to-end business productivity and workflow solution, providing a flexible foundation for digital growth. The proven EFI Packaging and Corrugated Suites deliver off the shelf productivity benefits that target specific business areas to reduce waste and inefficiency in the packaging production process, driving cost savings with integrated eCommerce, ERP and shop floor data collection. In the coming Highcon Euclid and Beam software release, Highcon customers will be

The partnership will improve lead times for printed material development by delivering an optimized supply chain that brings together buyers, converters, and digital converting equipment through robust two-way connectivity. The comprehensive platform will deliver value to businesses looking to improve efficiency, manage and optimize paper and inventory, reduce process waste and improve profits by leveraging automation. Ken Hanulec, EFI VP Worldwide Marketing said: “We see the digital corrugated market as being a strong growth area. The EFI Nozomi solutions have really begun revolutionizing the industry and as part of our holistic view of the marketplace we identified Highcon as being the leader in the next step in the digital process – digital finishing. Their digital cutting and creasing solutions enable the kind of on-demand production that drives customer success. We are excited about the

potential of addressing the market together.” Gaby Matsliach, Senior VP, General Manager, EFI Productivity Software added: “At EFI we have constantly focused our efforts on driving customer productivity and have released a comprehensive Suite of productivity solutions for the packaging industry. I have been impressed by Highcon’s similar drive for customer efficiency and we are delighted to partner with them in optimizing digital procurement and production workflows.” Shlomo Nimrodi, Highcon CEO said: “We are excited about working with EFI towards a genuinely end-to-end digital solution, Nozomi and Beam platforms, coupled with workflow automation that will answer the market needs for sustainability and Industry 4.0 manufacturing efficiencies. Collaboration with other industry players in the digital space is a critical part of our go to market strategy and we will continue to drive this strategy demonstrating our commitment to provide the best comprehensive solution to the inherent limitations in the conventional process.”

wide web flexographic printers. information from the clients CRM and upload all the data to the machine program and/or recall previous jobs quickly. Davide Pesenti adds:”CAMIS has always continued with improvements in its solutions. The same holds true with our CAMIS flexographic sleeve mounting systems. We have secured our customers maximum press run time, without the reliability and calibration issues. We have machines in the field and the initial beta tests show us that we have maintained the CAMIS reliability.” The CAMIS SMA is available in widths from 900mm up to 2000mm wide and with print repeats from 300mm up to 1300mm.

January 2021

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ACTEGA is at forefront of Food Safety: Removes Bisphenol A and Epoxysilane from ACTEbond ACTEbond laminating adhesives customers to have valuable competitive advantage for production of flexible stand-up pouches free of potentially hazardous chemicals. ACTEGA, manufacturer of specialty coatings, inks, adhesives and sealing compounds for the print and packaging industry, has successfully removed Bisphenol A (BPA) and Epoxysilane from its laminating adhesives product range. This now enables customers of ACTEbond Laminating Adhesives to produce stand-up pouches for food, petfood, cosmetics and household goods with increased confidence in consumer safety. As brand owners actively look to remove these potentially harmful substances from our food chain and improve consumer safety, the new ACTEbond formulation is expected to provide ACTEGA customers with a valuable competitive advantage – key to boosting profitability and driving business growth. Stephanie Dahmen, Teamlead Technical Service Adhesives, ACTEGA, comments: “Safeguarding consumer health is always a top priority when developing our products. When it comes to applications that will have contact with foods, we painstakingly investigate the safety of the relevant raw materials and use only materials that verifiably comply with food regulations such as FDA and EU directives. As such, the

eradication of BPA and Epoxysilane from our laminating adhesives range is a further step forward in adhering to the highest standards in packaging food safety and therefore, a significant milestone for both ACTEGA and our customers.” “Of course, this latest achievement for ACTEGA does not compromise our product quality, price or performance either. Added to which, flexible stand-up pouches are a more environmentally conscious packaging choice as they are light weight, as well as help to reduce the amount of plastic and overall waste generated by packaged goods. As such, it is important for us to support their continued use by further developing ACTEbond to meet all performance and safety requirements, for today and tomorrow,” said Dr. Thomas Sawitowski, Global Head of Business Line Flexible Packaging, ACTEGA. Offering versatility and very high resilience for most application requirements, ACTEGA ACTEbond Laminating Adhesives are the solution of choice for many world leading packaging convertors around the world. The portfolio includes: • ACTEbond ASB-908 high-performance

•

laminating adhesive for stand-up pouches. ACTEbond ASB-903-W205 (white) for eliminating the need for full-area printing with white. Also suitable for creating custom packaging designs by printing additional colours, as well as replacing white-colored polyester films. ACTEbond HT-049-S aliphatic, yellowing-resistant hardener for aluminium laminates. ACTEbond HT-020 aromatic, reactive hardener not requiring tempering and featuring exceptionally low curing time. ACTEbond HT-038 aliphatic, yellowingresistant hardener for transparent laminates.

The eradication of BPA and Epoxysilane from the ACTEbond portfolio is also in line with ALTANA’s wider business focus on market leading sustainability standards. The company has set itself an ambitious target of reducing its CO2 impact from production and energy procurement, to zero worldwide by 2025. In support of that goal, in March 2020, the power supply at all its locations was converted to renewable energies. “This will enable us to achieve climate neutrality in our direct sphere of influence,” concludes Dr. Thomas Sawitowski. “ACTEGA is fully committed to supporting sustainable, environmentally-responsible packaging production. While it’s not yet regulation that we remove BPA and Epoxysilane from our products in Europe, it’s important to us that all steps are taken to ensure the highest consumer standards. What’s more, early customer feedback confirms that ACTEbond without these potentially harmful substances continues to deliver the usual high performance, but with the additional competitive advantage of enhanced product safety.”

January 2021

Customers of ACTEbond® Laminating Adhesives can produce stand-up pouches for food, pet-food, cosmetics and household goods.

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Gallus High Performance Day 2021 Secure your productivity with an effective combination of toolset and expertise. Gallus is going to organize its virtual event Gallus High Performance Day 2021 on March 3rd as well as March 4th 2021. The event will highlight effective combination of toolset and expertise by Gallus to enable customers secure their productivity. Gallus experts will give participants insights to the product portfolio of their digital and conventional label printing systems. To keep the schedule short and exciting, participants can decide in advance what they want to see. They can choose from the following demo-sessions available: Demo session A – Digital label printing – Gallus Labelfire with a resolution of 1200 x 1200 dpi, equipped with the Digital Embellishment Unit (DEU) Demo session A – Conventional label printing – with flexo, screen, digital and offset printing units presenting the Gallus Labelmaster featured with a digital printbar followed by a demonstration of the Gallus RCS 430 combined with a Pantec Rhino hot foil embossing unit.

After these presentations Gallus experts will answer questions live on a Q&A session. It will also be possible to watch every session via stream after this event on the platform again. To do this, you just need to log in again. The platform will remain open for you until May 31, 2021.

Schedule March 3rd, (CET) 4:30 pm | March 4th, 8:30 am (CET - Delhi +4.5h) • Welcome by CEO Dr. Frank Schaum, Head of Business Unit Label, Gallus • Introduction into the program by Florian Kern, moderator of the event. There will be separate machine demonstrations on digital label printing as well as conventional label printing with Gallus Labelfire (equipped with DEU) and Gallus Labelmaster & Gallus RCS430 (equipped with Pantec Rhino hot foil embossing unit). The sessions will be conducted by Thomas Schweizer, Head of Product Management; Niels Siegel, Senior Sales Manager; and Claudio Nagel, Product Manager Conventional Systems, Gallus.

topic of Breakout session to be addressed by Vladimir Tyulpin, Global Segment Manager Digital Printing, Avery Dennison. For more information and registration, visit the Gallus even website. At first choose your preferred event day and a demo-session. Please complete the form to participate either on March 3rd, 2021 at 4:30 pm (CET) or March 4th, 2021 at 8:30 am (CET).

At the Breakout Sessions, Martin Leonhard, Business Development Management, Gallus will explain printing with low migration inks on Gallus Labelfire and Oliver P. Vetter, Head of Screen Printing Business, Gallus will explain about state of the art screen printing, from digital data to final label. Substrate selection for a hybrid UV Inkjet / Flexography will be the

Avery Dennison acquires ACPO ACPO overlaminate products will complement Avery Dennison’s product portfolio and add more value for their customers. Avery Dennison has acquired the business of Ohio-based pressure-sensitive overlaminate solutions provider ACPO for the purchase price of $87.6 million. ACPO is a provider of pressure-sensitive overlaminate products for the label and flexible packaging markets and has approximately 170 employees.

ACPO’s assets, including coating, finishing and distribution operations at its Oak Harbor, Ohio, headquarters, as well as three finishing and distribution sites in Atlanta, Georgia; Oak Creek, Wisconsin; and Vancouver, Washington. ACPO employees will transition to the Avery Dennison Label and Graphic Materials team.

“Our acquisition of ACPO will further strengthen our leadership in core label materials segments,” said Mitch Butier, Avery Dennison’s chairman, president and CEO. “By adding ACPO’s well-regarded and complementary overlaminate product, we are increasing our product portfolio and adding even more value for our customers.”

Avery Dennison has acquired the majority of

January 2021

signage printing

HP unveils unmatched versatility with latest Latex Printer portfolio HP equips PSPs to meet changing market demands with new HP Latex 700and 800 Printer series.

HP has introduced new Latex large format print solutions to help print service providers diversify their offerings and meet more challenging customers’ needs. After a year of business disruption across the large format industry, the HP Latex 700 and 800 series brings a suite of features that enable PSPs to be more agile, tackle ambitious projects and take on the highest value work. The new portfolio also delivers fast workflows that help businesses hit deadlines, while sharpening their sustainability edge.

“The new Latex 700 and 800 portfolio will allow PSPs to win big by navigating customer challenges in the next normal and embracing more ambitious projects – safe in the knowledge their work will deliver.” – Guayente Sanmartin, General Manager, Large Format Business, HP.

Key Notes : > Latest generation of HP Latex inks, and the whitest white ink with no yellowing over time. > Enhanced performance: HP Latex 700/800 series allows PSPs to increase productivity by up to 50%. > Launches new HP PageWide XL portfolio with advanced workflow and security features.

January 2021

“When you think about HP Latex, imagine the unique ability to say yes to every customer request, regardless of fast-changing schedule or application demands. Help meet deadlines with undisputable operator and environmental safety, as, with HP Latex, every signage & decor decision becomes a sustainable one,” said Guayente Sanmartin, General Manager, Large Format Business, HP. “The new Latex 700 and 800 portfolio will allow PSPs to win big by navigating customer challenges in the next normal and embracing more ambitious projects - safe in the knowledge their work will deliver.” Vitesh Sharma, Country Manager, Large Format Production Business, HP India said “The new HP Latex 700 and 800 series portfolio will offer professional colour quality, with a purpose to address every customer request, regardless of fast-changing schedule or application demands. They will also be able to bring significant improvements in productivity and efficiency by up to 50% to meet organization

goals. With our new HP Latex 700W and 800 printers we will empower PSPs to navigate customer challenges in the next normal and embrace more ambitious projects” The new HP Latex range in India consists of two devices –the HP Latex 700W and 800, which offer white ink capability for the first time in this category. It is the whitest white ink available on the market that does not yellow over time, enabling print businesses to produce neater outlines and add more contrast to darker supports. Meanwhile, updated printheads possessing more nozzles and producing speeds of up to 36 m2/hr (388 ft2/hr) allow the HP Latex 800 to offer 50% higher productivity levels compared to previous HP models. Print jobs executed on the new HP Latex series will deliver with vivid colors and finer image and text details, even at faster print speeds. Operationally, HP PrintOS also enables PSPs to monitor and control their print fleet using a cloud-based interface they can use virtually anywhere, anytime. Recent HP research reveals that 85% of PSP customers now demand sustainable products and practices. To meet this requirement, the new Latex products continue to build on HP’s long-lasting commitment to sustainable printing. All devices in the HP Latex 700 and 800 series use the HP Eco Carton – a cartridge made with cardboard material, reducing the amount of plastic used by 80%. HP’s water-based

pressideas/ signage

As part of this improvement, the HP cutter reads the black inner lines along the job and carries out additional measurements, further aided by new HP barcodes located on the printed sheets to identify jobs. Cutting on the new Latex 64 and 54 Plus Cutting Solutions is enhanced by a higher cutter downforce of up to 600gr .This provides the necessary pressure to deliver accurate cutting performance even on thicker media. inks are also kinder to the environment.

Improved HP Latex Print and Cut Plus In related news, HP has also introduced an updated Latex Print and Cut portfolio that is fully compatible with the Latex 700 and 800 Series. Equipped with the latest Raster Image Processor (RIP) software and completely new contour cutters, the devices allow for improved usability - making jobs easier and more intuitive than ever for signage and decorative printed applications. The HP Latex Print and Cut Plus Portfolio includes the following products: • HP Latex 335 Print and Cut Plus Solution • HP Latex 315 Print and Cut Plus Solution • HP Latex 64 Plus Cutting Solution • HP Latex 54 Plus Cutting Solution • HP Latex 54 Basic Plus Cutting Solution Updated features include optimized cutting accuracy through the enhanced Optical Position System (OPOS) configurations.

The user experience on the colored touch screen interface is highly responsive and includes an improved menu, making the entire solution simple to work with. The media basket also features a refined design and now has a smaller footprint when folded, enabling businesses to make better use of space.

Revamped HP PageWide XL Completing the announcements from HP are the new additions to the HP PageWide XL suite of large format print solutions. Aimed at enterprise and mid-market companies, as well as print reprohouses serving the architecture, engineering and construction industries, the new HP PageWide XL devicesprovide fast, simple, and secure solutions. The new range includes the following printers: • PageWide XL 3920 MFP • PageWide XL4200 • PageWide XL 5200 • PageWide XL 8200 Printer

The new HP PageWide XL printers deliver on the productivity needs of users while offering an improved experience. With the 4200, and 5200 models boasting a larger front panel increased to 15.6 inches (from 8 inches) -it is easier for users to preview real-time scans and undertake more complex printing tasks. Additionally, for the first time, users can carry out post-editing tasks, including crop, contrast, brightness, and rotation directly from the panel. For IT managers and CAD designers at enterprise and mid-market businesses, security is a major priority. The new PageWide XL solutions respond to this with new features to protect businesses in an increasingly connected world; including HP SecureBoot, Whitelisting and HP Connection Inspector – making the new PageWide XL range one of the most secure large format printers.

Availability The HP Latex 700 and 800 Series, the updated HP Latex Cut and Print Plus Solution, as well as the new additions to the PageWide XL portfolio, are expected to be available starting February 02, 2021.

Events Calendar Shaping the Future of Books 2021

Fespa Global Print Expo

China Print 2021

Date: 11 Feb 2021 at 11:00 CET Venue: Online Event (Webinar) Organised by Intergraf

Date: 09 MAR -21 to 12 MAR - 21 Venue: Amsterdam, Netherlands

Date: 23 JUN -21 to 27 JUN-21 Venue: New China International Exhibition Center, Beijing, China

Printing South China 2021

Screen Print India

Date: 04 MAR -21 to 06 MAR - 21 Venue: China Import and Export Fair Guangzhou, China

Date: 18 MAR -21 to 20 MAR - 21 Venue: Bombay Exhibition Centre Goregaon(E), Mumbai, India

Labelexpo India

Media Expo Mumbai

Virtual.drupa 2021

Date: 04 MAR -21 to 06 MAR - 21 Venue: Bombay Convention & Exhibition Centre Mumbai, India

Date: 20 APR -21 to 23 APR - 21 Venue: digital event (online)

Date: 16 NOV -21 to 19 NOV-21 Venue: India Expo Centre, Greater Noida, Delhi NCR, India

Readers are required to confirm the dates of the exhibition from the organizers. This is a reader service provided by PRESSIdeas and the company cannot be held responsible for any error or omission. If your event is not listed in the above list, kindly write to us at info@pressideas.com with subject as event and we shall gladly be including the same as above.

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PRESSIdeas January 2021 Issue

Articles inside

Replika expands with third Heidelberg Speedmaster CS 92

Kansal Graphics opts for KODAK CtP