Hardware - Wide Format Print

HP today announced that pixartprinting, of Venice, Italy, has bolstered its digital printing capabilities as part of an investment programme that includes four HP Indigo 7500 Digital Presses, an HP SmartStream Ultra Print Servers, and two HP Scitex LX600 Printers, using HP Latex Ink technology.

These new HP digital devices enhance the pixartprinting stable that already includes six HP Indigo 7000 Digital Presses, and five HP Scitex LX-series printers. This increased digital capability will be complemented with two new Komori 8-colour conventional presses.

Since its foundation by Matteo Rigamonti in 1994 to offer state-of-the-art DTP, scanning and typesetting services, the company has expanded into general commercial work using advanced web-to-print technologies and automated workflows. Today it has 65,000 customers and turns around 2,500 jobs each day comprising magazines, catalogues, postcards, stickers, labels and brochures. In addition, the company offers high resolution reproductions, posters, billboards, banners, displays, as well as packaging and other print services. Pixartprinting's growth is still increasing with 48 per cent on 2010 over 2009 and 62 per cent April 2011 compared to April 2010.

"For that reason we decide to improve our digital capability. Today pixartprinting's conventional printing business is nine per cent of total turnover," said Matteo Rigamonti, pixartprinting CEO. "Our customers don't care what technology is used to fulfil individual orders. Customer satisfaction is based on the quality of the result; respect for delivery times; and, of course, competitive prices. Considering that the quality of offset and digital prints are pretty much the same, there are no longer problems with uniformity of production."

Managing the powerhouse of conventional presses and ten HP Indigo presses will be Uragano (hurricane), a bespoke print management software programme developed by pixartprinting engineers that uses five parameters to decide whether jobs are to be printed conventionally or digitally: length of run, type of paper and weight, format and delivery times. Jobs to be printed digitally will be sent to the HP SmartStream Ultra Print Server which manages productivity, RIPping and colour management, providing a centralised workflow control that assigns jobs to presses for printing.

As a major European web-to-print company serving a market that requires print on demand and short time delivery, pixartprinting requires efficient and reliable high-volume data processing to ensure a smooth end-to-end workflow.

"The automated process management provided by Uragano and the HP SmartStream Ultra enables us to fully exploit the potential of our presses' capabilities, eliminating waste and inefficiencies," Rigamonti explained. "The result is that the breakeven point is lowered and production is optimised."

The two HP Scitex LX600 Printers and two of the HP Indigo 7500 Digital Presses were installed in April, with the other two and the HP SmartStream Ultra Print Server scheduled for installation early in the summer.

"Recognising that conventional and digital printing technologies are complementary can enable print service providers to leverage a range of leading-edge tools for the customers' benefit as well as their own," Rigamonti said. "We have invested in HP Indigo presses since 2001 and are pleased to add these latest presses to our production capabilities."

More information is available at www.youtube.com/hpgraphicarts or follow HP on www.twitter.com/hpgraphicarts.
 

Sabur Ink Systems has been appointed as the UK Distributor for La Meccanica’s extensive range of direct to textile printers.  Manufacturing digital textile printers since 2001, La Meccanica's current range includes printers based on the Mimaki JV5 with printing speeds of up to  54m2/hr.

Alongside these machines stands the new flagship model - the Qualijet K - engineered by La Meccanica and featuring the exceptional  Kyocera print heads providing printing capability of up to 500m2/hr at 600dpi direct to fabric.

The printers are perfectly suited to use with a range of inks including disperse, reactive and acid systems. The Qualijet HSB & K machines come equipped with a heat activated adhesive belt which allows for the printing of lightweight and even stretchy fabrics - preventing even the smallest movement of the substrate once in position and ensuring perfect registration.

“We believe the partnership between our two companies will help strengthen our position in the UK textile market and will sit perfectly alongside our Roland transfer sublimation packages, allowing us to offer a solution for all requirements within the digital textile printing community” said Aaron Burton of Sabur Ink Systems.

[Note from Editor: At Large Format Review, we don't usually publish stories about small format installations.  However, we feel the below story demonstrates the growing trend for full-service printers covering all sizes of output from postcards to posters...]

Efficiency is central to any printer’s business in today’s market. With more and more customers expecting jobs to be completed within 24 hours, KopyKat Printing’s investment in the Screen Truepress 344 will help to grow the business.

KopyKat, London, has invested in a Screen Truepress 344 digital offset press to boost fast turnaround times whilst maintaining high quality. The purchase will give KopyKat the capacity to meet growing demand.

KopyKat, based in London’s fashionable Shoreditch, is a full-service print company offering everything from corporate stationery to large format posters. It employs 12 staff and under the management of founder, Phil Moretti-Greene, the company has gone from strength to strength over the past 30 years. KopyKat has continually evolved to meet the needs of local customers, investing in a range of complementary kit. Alongside the new Screen Truepress 344 is a 5-colour Komori Lithrone 28 press, Xerox Docucolor 700 and 5000 digital machines, Epson Stylus Pro 9800 and 11880 large format inkjet printers and flexible finishing solutions.

Phil set up the company initially as a stationery print firm. Since then he has evolved its services to reflect the needs of its local and London-based customers. Although very London focused, the company delivers overnight to customer's multi-office locations nationwide. “As our customers’ needs have grown, so have our services and this evolution never stops" says Phil. The company hopes that its new purchase will help the business to continue to expand and adapt to customer’s requirements.

Today, KopyKat supports a large number of blue chip financial and legal companies as well as charity and campaign groups, many for over 20 years. There has been a recent influx of bars and nightclubs to the Shoreditch area that have turned to KopyKat for support with their printing. "This area has become very trendy over the last few years and we are surrounded by TV companies, agencies and clubs. Our walk-in trade has grown rapidly and we can get anything from 10-30 people through the door a day" says Phil. “This means that we need to be increasingly flexible and efficient to meet tight deadlines and that’s why we bought the Truepress.

We chose this machine to deliver fast-turnaround offset quality on jobs from 500-5,000 copies. These days everyone wants everything fast and our aim is to meet their needs” says Phil. “I like the automation of the Screen press. I can get a job from the digital front end onto the press in 11 minutes, compared to 45 minutes onto the offset press."

Colourgen reseller, Rennicks UK, has installed a Mutoh Zephy TS UV-cure printer to traffic sign productions specialists, PF Cusack. The printer is based at the company’s Wolverhamption production site.

PF Cusack is one of the UK’s leading providers to road maintenance companies and has recently installed a Mutoh Zephyr TS in order to deliver a one-stop-shop solution for its customers. Managing director, Phil Cusack, comments, “Good service is absolutely critical in this market. When customers place an order they often need it very quickly, particularly on temporary sites. We bought the Mutoh so that we could increase the range of products and services we offer and also the speed with which we can deliver them.”

The addition of the Mutoh printer means PF Cusack can now fulfil its customers’ requirements for long term road signage as part of its overall solution offering. “The Mutoh allows us to produce a virtually unlimited range of signage approved and certified for road usage. It is early days with the printer, but we are already seeing some great benefit and enhanced business opportunities with it,” adds Cusack.

Melanie Enser, Product Marketing Manager for Colourgen, says, “The new Zephyr TS is easy-to-use and delivered as a total solution, including workstation and RIP software. The printer significantly reduces production workflow steps compared to manual sign making methods. From one-offs and short runs to long run production, Mutoh’s Zephyr TS successfully creates traffic signs with brilliant colours, meeting the colour box and retro-reflectivity requirements.”

The Mutoh Zephyr TS has been adapted from the Mutoh Zephyr UV platform for printing directly onto Nippon Carbide’s Nikkalite® retroreflective sheeting, using Mutoh’s specially formulated Zephyr TS traffic sign inks. It enables traditional traffic sign-makers to complement their analog production equipment. It offers faster turnaround, more flexibility with regards to production planning, stock levels and helps them to reduce their environmental footprint.

The combination of printer, media, ink and UV protection overlay film fulfills the European standard for fixed vertical road traffic signs (EN-12899-1:2007). Traffic signs produced on Nikkalite® retroreflective sheeting with a Zephyr TS will have an outdoor durability of up to 10 years when laminated with the recommended Nikkalite® overlay film.

 

French packaging company, Cartonnages Vaillant, has purchased a six-colour, 500m2/hr, HP Scitex FB7500 Printer to increase business in large format point-of-sale (POS) graphics projects.

The six-colour FB7500 printer, which can image flexible or rigid substrates up to 165 x 320cm and 25mm thick, was recently installed at the company's 20,000m2 production site in Aire-sur-la-Lys.

Cartonnages Vaillant, whose service offering predominantly comprises traditional wrapping and packaging applications, began undertaking smaller information-based POS work in1995 using flexo and offset technology. According to one of Cartonnages' directors, Christian Normand, it was the long-held ambition to expand the company's capabilities and explore the area of larger format POS output that lead to the investment in the HP Scitex FB7500 Printer.

"The digital printing industry and the massive opportunities presented by inkjet technology have developed rapidly in recent times and, although keen to invest in this area, we wanted to ensure that the solution met all our needs," explains Normand.

The HP Scitex FB7500 Printer uses unique HP Scitex X2 drop-on-demand piezoelectric print heads and UV-curable ink -specifically designed for folded cardboard displays and self-adhesive vinyl.

"The FB7500 clearly stood out among other printers in its class and is the best for printing onto corrugated cardboard", he continued. "The printer delivers a number of performance-enhancing features, notably its speed and print quality, but we also particularly like the highly efficient vacuum table. This positions the media securely before printing and is a key differentiator to other suppliers' options we considered, some of which still require the use of adhesive tape to achieve this!"

As Normand explains, it was the noticeable increase in smaller orders that prompted both him and co-director, Bruno Delannoy, to diversify their offering and to meet customers' changing needs.

"We already had a narrow-width offset capability, but to effectively strengthen our foothold in large format POS projects, we needed to complement our line-up," he says. "The FB7500 allows us to print an entire graphic in one go, whereas our smaller offset equipment required two-piece production.

"Additionally, thanks to its multi-substrate capabilities and fast-drying UV-curable inks, the FB7500 allows us to produce eye-catching smaller information-based POS jobs onto a host of different rigid media, such as Dibond, Forex and Akylux."

Cartonnages Vaillant is currently printing test samples on such substrates to promote the company's newly acquired capabilities to its customers, the likes of which include those in the retail, cosmetics and IT sectors, as well as a number of advertising/creative agencies.

"We fully expect the HP FB7500 to deliver on its full potential and enable us to not only grow business with our existing accounts, but also open doors to new customers in the near future," concluded Normand.

 

HP has introduced an upgrade package for the HP Scitex XP2300 Printer that allows print service providers to confidently print on a range of media and reduce downtime with the ability to print a variety of applications with one set of inks.

Designed for high-volume print service providers (PSPs) interested in a UV-curable alternative to solvent ink printing, the HP Scitex XP2300 Printer now offers new billboard print modes for printing directly on inexpensive banner materials, which could previously be used only with solvent technologies. With these print modes, designed for HP Specialty Billboard Scitex Inks, customers can achieve a glossy or matte finish using one ink and reduce the time spent switching inks between print jobs. Customers who install the upgrade also begin receiving support through HP Scitex Print Care, a set of tools and services that anticipate technical issues, enable remote diagnosis and provide performance information.

"Since introducing the HP Scitex XP2300 Printer, we have been working closely with our customers to identify the features that would enable them to move more jobs from their solvent devices to this proven, UV-curable platform," said Yariv Avisar, vice president and general manager, Scitex Large-format Solutions, HP. "The upgrade package allows our customers to create a competitive advantage with more a productive, cost-effective UV solution that also reduces the impact of printing on the environment."

HP Scitex XP2300 Printer owners that want improved versatility and productivity with the benefits of HP Scitex Print Care can seamlessly upgrade with the HP Scitex XP2300 Upgrade Package, available worldwide on September 15.