Electronics For Imaging, Inc. honoured the first four EFI Reggiani BOLT customers for moving to the leading edge of high-volume digital textile production with the groundbreaking, new ultra-high-speed single-pass digital textile printer.
EFI Reggiani showed the 72-inch (1.8-meter) wide printer at the June 20-26 ITMA textile industry tradeshow in Barcelona. On June 22, the company presented EFI Reggiani Innovation Pioneer Awards highlighting these customers' efforts to drive innovation in textile supply chains using the latest technology.
The awards ceremony during ITMA recognised the quartet of customers investing in the Reggiani BOLT - the first commercially available, single-pass inkjet printer capable of direct-to-textile production at speeds up 295 linear feet (90 linear meters) per minute. The first of those customers, Italian digital textile company Texprint s.r.l. has already installed and is operating the world's first EFI Reggiani BOLT printer.
The second and third honorees in the EFI Reggiani awards ceremony were Hunbul Tex Pvt. Ltd. - one of Pakistan's leading digital textile printing businesses - and Pakistan-based apparel brand and retailer Firdous Cloth Mill Pvt. Ltd. Both chose the Reggiani BOLT to produce designs for men's and women's fashions. The fourth honoree, Zaman Textile Mills Pvt. Ltd., purchased the Reggiani BOLT printer on display at ITMA; the Pakistan-based company will use the printer to produce textiles for home décor and apparel.
Growing digital printing with sustainable, high-end single-pass innovation
"These four customers deserve our Innovation Pioneer Award for their investment in state-of-the-art technology, and they will show the world just how much more efficient and profitable digital can be using the new breakthroughs the EFI Reggiani BOLT provides," said EFI Reggiani Vice President and General Manager Adele Genoni. "We wish to thank them for their trust and we look forward to working with these customers and future Reggiani BOLT users on creating a better, greener future for the textile industry."
As the fastest inkjet textile printer product at ITMA, the Reggiani BOLT was the star digital solution, featuring a cutting-edge, high-performance printhead system with highly efficient recirculation features, giving users reliable, superior-quality printing for a full range of design needs. Printing in resolutions from 600 x 600 dots per inch (dpi) up to 600 x 4,800 dpi, users benefit from direct-to-textile imaging with variable drop sizes from 5 to 30 picoliters for accurate, high-end image quality. It is a robust, industrial platform designed for 24/7 operation, with superior printhead life and minimal maintenance needs. Plus, the printer can include one or more analog printing stations as an option, integrated into the digital printer for special effects.
The Reggiani BOLT printer includes the new EFI Fiery BT-1000 digital front end (DFE) - a professional colour management and RIP solution featuring superior screening and fine dithering algorithms for high-quality print results, with excellent detail reproduction, smooth gradations, clean solid colours, deep blacks, and high saturation. With the speed of the printer and its robust Fiery DFE, users can stream jobs to production in real time, reducing the cost per meter of digitally printed textiles while creating a broader range of designs quickly and efficiently.
In addition to the Reggiani BOLT, the entire digital product lineup of EFI technologies on display was well received by ITMA visitors from around the world. The EFI Reggiani ITMA showcase of advanced technologies also included the EFI Reggiani COLORS, a high-quality, highly productive printer with up to 12 colours and unmatched printing quality and uniformity. The exhibit also featured a complete range of water-based EFI Reggiani inks as well as EFI Mezzera indigo and dyeing technologies that provide deeper shades and superior fastness while reducing chemical usage by up to 40% compared with other dyeing technologies.
In addition, EFI showed a complete textile ecosystem for end-to-end digital textile production incorporating EFI Fiery DesignProsoftware for streamlined design of textile repeats, colorways, wovens and knits, and a new version of EFI Optitex 2D/3D textile CAD software offering streamlined Print & Cut workflow integration with Reggiani printers for up to 15% greater efficiency in textile usage.
