FESPA EURASIA getting ready for 2018

FESPA Eurasia 2018, the region’s one of the leading event for screen, textile and digital wide format, returns to Istanbul, Turkey from 6 to 9 December 2018.
2018 will be the 6th edn. of the exhibition, which has gone from strength to strength, growing its visitor audience by 25% since the first event in 2013. The last FESPA Eurasia, which took place in 2018 attracted 8,761 unique visitors. Roz Guarnori, exhibitions director at FESPA comments: “Since the launch of FESPA Eurasia in 2013 we have

Staff Writer, 12 September 2018

Sistrade’s software reduces time

Stocks and purchases control is crucial for sustainable company management. It has direct outcomes in financial and operational results.
SISTRADE provided to its customers a system for stocks and purchases management flexible, with  exponential solutions, adjustable to accommodate your company rules and create an actual generation of business management scenario for a faster and more stable growth of your enterprise.
Why Sistrade stocks and purchases management module? Reduction of time consumed

Staff Writer, 12 September 2018

Heidelberg receives InterTech Technology Award

Printing Industries of America (PIA), the world’s largest graphic arts trade association, has recognized the industrial inkjet printing system Primefire 106 of Heidelberger Druckmaschinen AG (Heidelberg) with the distinguished 2018 InterTech Technology Award. With 39 InterTech Technology awards in total, Heidelberg is the most decorated manufacturer in the industry.

Staff Writer, 27 August 2018

Agfa revenue and profit fall continues in Q2

Agfa’s revenue and gross profit both declined in Q2, continuing the trend seen in Q1.

The Belgian manufacturer recorded sales of €559m (£503m) in the second quarter, down 10% on Q2 2017, with first-half sales standing at €1.11bn, down 8.4% year-on-year.

The company’s gross profit fell by 15.5% to €180m in Q2, with first-half gross profit down by 11.7% to €358m. Gross profit margin was 32.2% in Q2, which Agfa said was in line with Q1.

Group recurring EBITDA was down by 19.5% to €49m and

Staff Writer, 25 August 2018

HP print growth continues in Q3

HP Inc’s revenue increased by 12% year-on-year in Q3, from $13bn (£10.1bn) to $14.6bn, with its Printing division continuing its current growth with sales up by 11%, from $4.68bn to $5.19bn.
Operating margins in the manufacturer’s Printing segment, which comprises supplies, commercial hardware and consumer hardware, averaged 16% for the three-month period to 31 July 2018.
HP’s Personal Systems division, which comprises workstations, notebooks and desktops, saw net revenue climb by 12%

Staff Writer, 25 August 2018

Heidelberg to hold digital performance event

Heidelberg will provide the first UK demonstration of its new Versafire EP and EV digital presses at an open house in September.
Both the EP (Performance) and EV (Value) printers will be shown working in tandem with the Prinect Digital Front End at the event and Heidelberg will also demonstrate the Speedmaster CX 75 B2 litho press.
The company said this will enable visitors to see how Heidelberg can control colour across both technologies and also how litho and digital can be used in tandem.
“This

Staff Writer, 13 August 2018

Koenig & Bauer Flexotecnica has changed their management

Koenig & Bauer Flexotecnica has changed their management. Dr. Peter Lechner is the new CEO at Koenig & Bauer Flexotecnica. He succeeds Christoph Müller, who is moving to the company’s supervisory board as chairman. “Peter Lechner has many years of experience in the field of flexible packaging. He will continue on the positive path of Flexotecnica and achieve our ambitious goals,” Müller said. “Our order books are full. This year a raft of presses we have sold will go into operation

Staff Writer, 13 August 2018

Intec launches second-gen ColorFlare

Intec launches second-gen ColorFlare. Commercially available with immediate effect, the new machine can be used as an in-house decorative effects system for short-run, on-demand digital applications, as well as for laminating traditional litho output. The device has replaced the CF1000LX – a 2017 update to the 2016-released CF1000 model – in the manufacturer’s portfolio. Like its predecessor, the CF1200 can foil, laminate (matt, gloss and soft-touch) and produce holographic special effects. It

Staff Writer, 13 August 2018

Konica Minolta has been awarded a contract by a public agency

Konica Minolta Business Solutions Asia (Konica Minolta), an integral value provider in enterprise content management, has been awarded a contract by a public agency to digitise its operational efficiency and accessibility of records via its Document Process Outsourcing Solution. With its expertise and experience in digitisation of backend repositories, Konica Minolta will assist the agency to digitise approximately 10 million pages of physical materials such as case files, corporate data and

Staff Writer, 13 August 2018

Brazilian May paper production falls 11% y-o-y

Brazilian May paper production falls 11% y-o-y; 13% over April. The latest data released by the Brazilian Tree Industry Assn (Ibá) show that the country produced 763,000 tonnes of paper in May 2018, 11% lower than May 2017 and 13.1% down compared to April. The 116,000 tonnes month-to-month decline is explained by a truckers’ strike that affected road transportation all over the country during 11 days at the end of May. Of the total paper produced in Brazil in May 2018, 380,000 tonnes were

Staff Writer, 13 August 2018

Domino opens new fluids facility

Domino Printing Sciences has marked its 40th anniversary with the opening of a new fluids manufacturing facility in Liverpool.
The 16,000sqm site, which was officially opened last on 18th July, will provide the Cambridge-headquartered commercial inkjet printing and industrial coding, marking and labelling equipment manufacturer with a significant increase in productivity and capacity and a reduction in lead times.
The expansion will also create 19 new jobs, bringing the total workforce at the

Staff Writer, 13 August 2018

German mill begins proceedings

German paper mill Zanders has opened insolvency proceedings, citing reasons including increases in raw material and energy costs.
The company said that following its acquisition by current owner Mutares in May 2015, and with the support of its employees, important restructuring successes were achieved, a considerable part of its investment and repair bottleneck was eliminated and its processes were “significantly improved”.
But despite sales growth of an average of 12% between 2015 and 2017, the

Staff Writer, 13 August 2018

Xerox CEO’s imperative to transform business

Xerox’s new chief executive has pledged to “transform” the business in order to better serve customers and stakeholders, and has also stated that the group is not being actively offered for sale.
John Visentin, who became chief executive as part of the large-scale board changes at the business in May, made the statement as the group announced its second-quarter results.
He outlined his imperatives to drive sales, optimise and simplify Xerox’s operations, and re-energise innovation at the

Staff Writer, 13 August 2018

De La Rue on World Cup holograms

De La Rue has completed the production of official licensed product authentication holograms for Fifa World Cup 2018 memorabilia, which give football fans the confidence that the products they buy are genuine.
The Basingstoke-headquartered business has worked with Fifa since 2006 on the last three World Cup tournaments. All official memorabilia is authenticated with De La Rue’s highly secure holographic labels, which protect against counterfeit goods.
The latest contract was signed in July 2016

Staff Writer, 13 August 2018

Adobe unveils PDF Print Engine 5

Adobe has announced version 5 of its Adobe PDF Print Engine (APPE 5) rendering technology for pre-press workflows. The new version extends PDF Print Engine’s reliable colour reproduction with new capabilities to harness the full potential of today’s digital and conventional presses, Adobe said.
It will also maximise colour impact in upcoming textile presses, industrial print stations and digital presses for label and packaging production.
Improvements have been made to APPE 5 to enable it to keep

Staff Writer, 13 August 2018

Flint Group is again looking to celebrate best-in-class print production

Flint Group is again looking to celebrate best-in-class print production with its 14th Annual Print Awards for its worldwide customers. The awards celebrate the best from Flint Group’s three divisions: Flint Group Narrow Web, Flint Group Flexographic and Flint Group Digital Solutions (Xeikon). Entries can be submitted by customers online for various print technologies, including: Water-based flexo, UV flexo (both conventional & UV LED), UV offset, Digital printing, UV letterpress, UV

Staff Writer, 13 August 2018

Idealliance has announces new chief executive officer from October

Idealliance has recently announced that vice president, Timothy Baechle will become its new chief executive officer on October 1, 2018. David Steinhardt, who has served as Idealliance President and Chief Executive Officer since 2001, will become President Emeritus and continue working full-time in partnership with the new CEO and leading key innovation working groups. Idealliance is a global thought leader in the graphic communications industry and a non-profit organization with 11

Staff Writer, 13 August 2018

PSI announced leadership changes for 2018

Paper Stock Industries (PSI), a national chapter of the Institute of Scrap Recycling Industries, announced leadership changes for 2018. Leonard Zeid of Midland Davis Corporation was named Executive VP & Director of the Brokerage Division. As head of Midland’s brokerage group, Zeid is responsible for Midland’s network brokers throughout North America. Zeid’s team manages a variety of commodities, including paper, plastics, metals and other materials. Leonard has been in brokerage for over 28

Staff Writer, 13 August 2018

MPS is now locally represented in Vietnam by Print & Pack Machinery Co., Ltd

MPS is now locally represented in Vietnam by Print & Pack Machinery Co., Ltd. Explaining the choice for PPMC, MPS Area sales manager, Suwannee Tantisrisuk said: “PPMC brings many years of experience in the field of consultancy, machinery, service and training. They offer customers in Vietnam complete solutions from printing to finishing, after sales service and maintenance, training, as well as software products, workflow management systems, spare parts and consumables. Because of rapid

Staff Writer, 13 August 2018

Fuji Xerox boss: break-up 'will not happen'

The boss of Fuji Xerox says he is “confident” that the joint venture will not be broken up as a result of the ongoing takeover tussle between Fujifilm and Xerox.

In an interview with Reuters, Fuji Xerox president Kouichi Tamai said he believed that breaking up the long-standing joint venture would not be a viable option for Xerox.

“I’m confident a break-up will not happen because that wouldn’t make sense [for Xerox] in terms of the energy, money and time it would take to do so,” he

Staff Writer, 12 July 2018

Durst has won the prestigious European Digital Press Association (EDP) Award

Durst has won the prestigious European Digital Press Association (EDP) Award for “Best flatbed/hybrid printer > 250m/h”. The award was given for the new P5 platform with the new Durst P5 250 HS printing system, which was presented at the end of January at the Durst premises in Lienz, and attracted so much attention that even Austria ‘s Federal Chancellor Sebastian Kurz was informed about the innovation during a visit. “We are delighted with the EDP award because it proves that Durst P5 is a

Staff Writer, 09 July 2018

Color-Logic has certified the Nilpeter Panorama DP-3

Color-Logic has certified the Nilpeter Panorama DP-3 standalone digital press for use with the Color-Logic process for label applications. Color-Logic’s director of sales and marketing, Mark Geeves, commented: “Test samples of Color-Logic printing done on the Nilpeter Panorama digital press were outstanding. Color-Logic has worked with Nilpeter conventional presses since our founding nearly ten years ago, ensuring that converters who currently operate Nilpeter flexo presses and add the Nilpeter

Staff Writer, 09 July 2018

De La Rue accentuates the positives

Underlying sales and profits are up at De La Rue, but the group’s results were overshadowed by the ongoing fall-out over the UK passport contract loss, which has resulted in one investor viewing the group as again being a potential takeover target.
In the year to 31 March, group sales were up 7% to £493.9m, while adjusted operating profit (excluding the £60.9m gain from the sale of its specialist paper business) fell 11% to £62.8m.
If paper is excluded from the figures, turnover increased by 4%

Staff Writer, 09 July 2018

Xaar looks set to make an unspecified number of job cuts

Xaar looks set to make an unspecified number of job cuts after announcing “cost actions” following lower than expected sales in its legacy ceramics business falling in the first five months of the year. In a trading update released on 27th June, the Cambridge-headquartered inkjet developer said: “We had previously indicated that the increasing proportion of total revenue represented by new products would mean a stronger second half weighting in full-year sales; we now expect that weighting to

Staff Writer, 09 July 2018

Avery Dennison collaborates for wine and spirits design project

Avery Dennison collaborates for wine and spirits design project. Collaboration between Avery Dennison, Italian design agency Smith Lumen and Italian printer Rotas Italia has resulted in an award-winning design project in wine and spirits. Converters, designers and brand owners are now being invited to receive their own copy of the ‘Black & White’ envelope, with its set of inspiring wine and spirits labels that follow a common design theme. Materials used in the project include the brilliant

Staff Writer, 09 July 2018

Heidelberg optimizes its financing

Heidelberger Druckmaschinen AG (Heidelberg) is optimizing its financing structure. The company today decided to redeem a sum of around €55 million from the current high-yield bond (with a coupon of 8 percent), which runs to 2022 and amounts to some €205 million. This sum will be repaid on July 18, 2018. Issued in 2015, the bond was a key element in extending the financing structure’s maturity profile at that time. The repayment is being made from cash on hand and will have a positive impact on

Staff Writer, 09 July 2018

Agfa hosts first public showing of new hybrid

Agfa Graphics has shown off its new Jeti Tauro H3300 LED hybrid printer in public for the first time at an event held at its Belgian headquarters.
Took place across Tuesday (12 June) and Wednesday, the manufacturer invited more than 300 guests to the event in Mortsel, predominantly existing and prospective customers.
The event centred around the 3.3m-wide H3300 LED, which was announced at Fespa in Berlin last month but was not shown at that event as the manufacturer instead chose to use an

Staff Writer, 09 July 2018

Brother launches Work Smart series of compact and connected printers

Brother launches Work Smart series of compact and connected printers for home. The newest printers from Brother are small on both size and price. Brother International Corporation announced the Work Smart Series, a line of connected budget printers for casual users and home offices. The series includes four models priced from about $80 to $130: the MFC-J491DW, the MFC-J497DW, the MFC-J690DW and the MFC-J895DW. Brother says the new inkjet line is designed with a mix of features in a more compact

Staff Writer, 09 July 2018

Canon unveils consumer-level photo printer for $50

Canon unveils consumer-level photo printer for $50. The Pixma iP2600 prints using Canon’s Full-Photolithography Inkjet Nozzle Engineering (FINE) print heads, the same technology used in its pricier models. “The Pixma iP2600 Photo Printer delivers exceptional photo print quality and speed at an affordable price,” said Yuichi Ishizuka, general manager of Canon U.S.A.’s Consumer Imaging Group, in a statement. The print heads in the iP2600 use 1,472 nozzles to deliver up to 4800×1200 dpi color

Staff Writer, 09 July 2018

UPM taps Andritz for PM 2 rebuild at Nordland Papier mill

UPM taps Andritz for PM 2 rebuild at Nordland Papier mill in Germany. Andritz has received an order from UPM Nordland Papier in Germany to rebuild PM 2 at the site in Dörpen from uncoated woodfree (UWF) paper to produce release/glassine papers. The rebuild will increase UPM’s release liner capacity by 110,000 tonnes/yr. The start-up of the rebuilt machine is scheduled for Q4 2019. According to Andritz, its scope of supply includes the actual PM rebuild as well as modifications of the stock

Staff Writer, 09 July 2018