Digital printing, automation to drive drupa '08

By Mary L. Van Meter
Publisher


DUSSELDORF, Germany — With more than 550 million newspapers printed worldwide each day, the power of the printed word remains strong, said officials at a weeklong event held last month to promote drupa 2008.

Newspapers are just one segment of the millions of tons of printed materials produced each year, said Albrecht Bolza-Schunemann, chairman of drupa 2008 and chief executive officer of Koenig & Bauer AG.

Bolza-Schunemann said contemporary newspapers have little to fear in comparison to Web sites, particularly since users still rate papers as friendlier and easier to read. “Consumers rate nothing as highly as newspapers in terms of credibility,” he said. Still, he said integrated workflow and process control will become more critical factors as publishers find ways to cut production costs. “Automation will be a key factor,” he said.
Albrecht Bolza-Schunemann, chairman of drupa 2008 and chief executive officer of Koenig & Bauer AG, touted the power of print at the January drupa preview. Photos: Newspapers & Technology

The global volume of printed materials, he said, is increasing at an annual clip of 3 percent to 5 percent. In more populous nations such as China and India, print growth is galloping along at double-digit rates, he said.

Bolza-Schunemann, along with drupa CEO Werner Matthias Dornscheidt, kicked off drupa Media Week. This year’s drupa, from May 29 through June 11, will showcase more than 1,800 exhibitors.

Among the key technologies drupa visitors can expect to see are those related to digital printing, along with an increased focus on automated and touchless workflow solutions, vendors said.

Companies such as Screen, Kodak, Ricoh, Fujifilm Corp. and Xerox Corp. said they’ll demonstrate hybrid applications based on the nexus of digital and offset technology.

These print-on-demand and Web-to-print approaches are geared to helping printers expand margins and attract new revenue streams.

Among drupa developments:

•Domino Printing Sciences said it would release two newspaper-oriented inkjet-based variable-print products, the K150 inkjet printer and version 4.5 of the vendor’s Bitjet printing system. Both enable high-speed inline inkjet printing and both can be integrated with web offset and flexo presslines.

•Screen previewed the TruePress Jet 520, a full-color variable printing system, as well as the PlateRite 2000+ thermal computer-to-plate system.

The TruePress can print different images and text on each page and features a roll-fed paper transport system, according to Tim Taylor, marketing director (see photo, page 24). Taylor said the system can be used with any uncoated newspaper stock and will be aimed at newspapers that want to produce print editions at remote sites.

“CTP represents 90 percent of Screen gross revenues and we are very committed to this market,” Taylor said. “But because Drupa only comes around every four years, we will devote a majority of our booth to print-on-demand to showcase that we are in the market.”

The 2000+, meantime, can produce 106 broadsheet or 49 panorama plates per hour and is Screen’s fastest machine. It’s available immediately.

•Ricoh showcased its Ricoh Pro C900 and C900s digital printer. Designed for high-volume print customers, it is integrated with a range of inline finishing devices that support perfect binding, ring binding and other capabilities.

•Presstek Inc. said it will display its chemistry-free platemaking systems, its line of 52DI and 34DI digital printers and its Momentum Pro workflow software.

The 52DI is a landscape digital offset press that can support FM screening without additional time or expense, Presstek said. The 34DI is a portrait format digital press.

•Fujifilm and Xerox said they would cross-promote each other’s digital printing capabilities as part of their reseller agreement. Among specific products to be displayed will be Fujifilm’s Brilla HD Pro-V chemistry-free digital plate and PressMax pressroom chemistry.

•Kodak said it will demonstrate its next-generation digital inkjet press, Kodak Stream Concept Press.

The high-speed press features print resolution that exceeds 600 dots per inch and relies on continuous inkjet technology. Kodak said Stream will be geared to commercial printers that produce monthly page volumes of 10 million or more.

“Stream Technology will bring some exciting changes to the industry and this technology demonstration will be an impressive display of its offset class capabilities,” said Ronen Cohen, vice president of marketing of Kodak’s inkjet printing solutions.

Additionally, Kodak will display Prinergy 5.0 workflow software and other CTP systems and associated software geared to commercial printers. —NT

Editor’s note: Newspapers & Technology is one of only seven U.S. publications to be selected as a drupa 2008 media partner and the only one whose primary focus is newspaper production.

Digital print vendors make strides, but will newspapers answer call?

By Don Piontek
Special to Newspapers & Technology

Over the past five years, digital print technology has expanded its turf dramatically.

In commercial print, book printing, direct mail and transactional printing, digital production is now considered an everyday technology.

And there’s more to come. By 2012, it’s estimated that digital printing will be approaching parity with offset printing as a component of the graphics universe.

The exception to this rule? Newspaper printing.


Photo: Screen

The Screen TruePress Jet 520, to be introduced at drupa, is capable of running full 4-color at speeds of up to 209 feet per minute.

Still mostly a web offset world, newspaper production has been little impacted by the digital print revolution. But this may change in the next year or two, thanks to the introduction of high-speed digital systems that boast increased quality, color and inline finishing.

Many major high-speed digital print systems have been introduced over the past year and there are more to come.

Most (not all) offer, or will offer, continuous-web inkjet printers with web speeds of up to 650 feet per minute and printable widths of more than 20 inches. For the most part, these machines print at a resolution of 600-by-600 dots per inch, and cover the process color gamut well.

Newspapers take a serious look

No chance of anyone mistaking their output for offset, but digital output has gotten quite good and it’s getting better all the time.

These new printers will prompt the newspaper community to take a serious look at digital, and the advantages it brings to their business.

One area drawing interest is the insert, or FSI, business.

The FSI business at major metro dailies was once controlled by the big food and retail chains that gravure-printed millions of flyers for mass distribution over a metro’s entire geographical area. That’s long gone.

Today, microzoning in the newspaper-packaging department and better targeting now permit targeted messages to be delivered close to each store’s “ground zero” radius.

As a result, long insert runs are now broken up into many zoned segments. Still, the FSI production process is wholly an offset one, with an average of six weeks of lead time between artwork and actual inserting. And of most firms using FSI advertising, the majority are still national big box food, retail and electronics chains such as Best Buy, Target and Wal-Mart.

Valuable market untapped

This has left a valuable potential market untapped by the major metro dailies: The smaller mom-and-pop stores that would like to distribute close to their establishments’ radius. This is where digital could fill the gap. Picture a 500-foot-per-minute color inkjet press (or two) located in the packaging department, cranking out quality color, microzoned quantities of inserts on demand for smaller retailers.

Remember that such a press requires only a certified .PDF or PostScript file. No plates. Insert versions can run back-to-back with no downtime whatsoever for changeover. Insert orders could potentially be accepted up to a few days (or less) before the packaging operation began. A digital in-plant process would permit newspapers to offer insert distribution to this non-chain retail market with affordable production costs and selected distribution.

But let’s take this a bit further.

How about neighborhood-specific publications? A major metro area is not a homogenized geographic block. It’s composed of many neighborhoods, each with its own character.

Digital print could enable the creation of neighborhood-tailored publications that can be distributed quickly and cost efficiently. This technology could open up new markets for metro dailies. Papers as varied as the Chicago Tribune, The Denver Post and Knoxville (Tenn.) News-Sentinel all print hyper-local weeklies tailored to particular neighborhoods or suburbs. Why not print these on digital systems instead of web offset machines?

More than inserts

Today’s high-speed digital printers can crank out complete publications and not just inserts.

Kodak, for example, in 2006 partnered with Swiss manufacturer Hunkeler to develop an integrated newspaper printing and cutting-sheeting-folding system that can pump out up to 1,000 40-page newspapers per hour.

The Kodak Versamark system has created great interest in Europe, and a few metro dailies in the United States have given it very serious consideration.

Editor’s note: Kodak will introduce a higher speed digital printer at this year’s drupa. The system will use the vendor’s Stream continuous inkjet technology and feature a thermal, drop-on-demand design.

Meantime, The New York Times is using continuous web printers from another digital press vendor, Oce, to produce its European editions.

The printed papers are distributed to newsstands at major European airports and cities each day.

By using digital technology, The Times is able to close its European edition much later than it would have had it used conventional web offset printing. The final layout is downloaded from the United States and the printers begin spinning up within minutes.

On-demand possibilities

How about a scenario where these digital printers are based at major U.S. airports such as O’Hare International in Chicago or Hartsfield in Atlanta?

RFID technology located in various airport newsstands could automatically transmit reprint alerts to the system, which would then proceed to print more copies. No more long truck trips in heavy traffic in order to deliver copies from the plant. Not only that, such a system could print the great majority of newspapers sold at the newsstands, thus increasing the digital printer’s utilization and efficiency.

High-speed continuous web digital print systems have found homes in a wide variety of applications that were formerly offset only.

Book printers use these systems to produce small orders, with runs as low as one or two books, on demand.

One such print-on-demand publisher, LaVergne, Tenn.-based Lightning Source Inc., uses its digital foundation to fill 19,000 book orders daily at an average of 1.9 unique books per order.

Transactional and financial services printers, meantime, are using the color capabilities of these printers to incorporate promotional messages into customers’ statements.

Potential customers see the output quality and speed capability and find lots of applications that can migrate to digital from offset. Although these digital presses aren’t cheap — some integrated systems can cost more than $3 million — newspapers should have no problems finding profitable niches or new business opportunities where high-speed digital print could be part of the solution.

All it takes is imagination.

Editor’s note: British manufacturer IBIS Bindery Systems Ltd. offers a high-speed folding, stitching, gluing and trimming system called the Smart-binder, which the vendor said is suited for many in-line digital newspaper applications.

Don Piontek is the Minneapolis-based U.S. representative for digital finishing systems manufacturer IBIS Bindery Systems. He can be reached at 952.937.5100 or via e-mail at finishingres@qwest.net.