A complete package

Imagine the scene if you will dear reader. You accept a job for 1,000sq m worth of vinyl banners for an outdoor multi-venue sports event, everything seems to be progressing well. Then late in the afternoon, the day before the event is due to kick off, the dreaded phone call comes. Your customer now also wants ten 3m square hoarding boards done as they have had a late sponsor come on board, and they want them tomorrow morning. So, if you are in possession of a roll-to-roll device you will have to say ‘thanks, but no thanks’. There is not even enough time to get it outsourced. If you have a flatbed system in-house then happy days, you can keep your staff late and make a new customer very happy. But, many more sign shops fall into the latter category, as they do not have the floor space or investment capital to run two dedicated wide-format devices. But, if they stretched themselves just a bit, they could obtain the ability to say ‘yes’ to that customer, without the need to massively overextend their debt levels or increase their floor space. And that is using the latest wide-format hybrid print technology.

Dominating the development of these systems today at the high-end productivity end of the sector, which this feature will focus on, is Agfa, EFI, and Durst. There are of course a range of other highly-respected players producing hybrid kit for mid to low-productivity requirements such as Mimaki, Roland DG, Mutoh, Gandy Digital, Fujifilm, Screen/Inca, and HP (Scitex). But these three will be the focus of this particular look at this market, as they have focused on producing high-end productivity hybrids that can flip between rigid and roll-to-roll work with ease and without any loss in fidelity, or industrial levels of reliability.  And all have plans in the pipeline to continue strong development in this segment and expand their offering.
 
Ample ambition

Agfa is a household name, and is one of the three major Japanese graphic arts giants that includes Kodak and Fujifilm to have transitioned from photographic and medical imaging equipment into the print industry. First through its commercial litho printing plate business, inks, and software development arms, and then into the wide-format inkjet sphere.

Today it maintains a very strong presence in commercial print, and has steadily grown in stature and confidence in wide-format since its acquisition of Gandy. A highly pivotal moment though for the firm was the launch of its own common architecture wide-format technology, with its first iterations being the :Jeti Mira and Tauro. The latter is of key importance to the hybrid inkjet system field and this feature’s focus, as it has a highly-effective combination of productivity (275sq m/h), price point, quality, and ink technology—all housed within an industrial standard chassis.

The Mira is designed as a flatbed, but can also transition to roll-to-roll with a bolt on option. It has also launched its M2500i and H3200i, which are also hybrid systems and fall into the mid-productivity segments.

Willy Van Dromme, marketing manager, sign and display, Agfa Graphics, explains its development strategy: “Flatbed printing is indeed a flourishing market segment, and we took a very strong position in the high-end flatbed segment with the Titan, which has a moving table system.

“Then with the launch of the Mira, which is a moving gantry system with a very efficient print and prepare implementation, that further grew our market reach and share.

“Now our ambition is to continue growing our market share in that segment. And now that we have added LED curing to our common platform, we continue to invest where we have a strong and solid proposition.”

Agfa’s approach to hybrid technology has received high acclaim from the sector’s media and award schemes, taking top gongs both from Drupa and the SGIA for its technology’s image quality, ink consumption, and speed.

Its Thin Ink Layer technology has received particularly high acclaim, as it is able to reduce ink consumption significantly compared to competitor systems, without a loss in image quality.

Van Dromme continues: “The most intense growth that we enjoyed was after the introduction of the Tauro, our high-end hybrid, where we compete against the Durst P10, EFI Vutek LX 3 Pro, and GS3250—even against the HS125 Pro—and that continues to be a very successful product across Europe.



“We looked closely at what was the productivity and price position of competitor devices, then knowing we would be at the very top level in terms of image quality, we were able to create a package that offered productivity and quality equitable to our competition at lower ink consumptions. And all that is backed up by Agfa’s renowned service levels.”

Looking to its success in the UK market, Steve Collins, inkjet marketing and channel manager at Agfa Graphics, explains its strategy is paying off: “Our activity in the UK is very buoyant, with a lot of interest around our hybrid technology.

“We are gathering momentum, and it really is at the top end where we need to educate the market about our capabilities and effectiveness. The story we have is that we are a ‘one stop shop’, offering print engine, inks, service, finance, and even media through Litho Supplies in the UK. And that message is getting through.”

Say ‘yes’

Now we move over to EFI, which has one of the largest market shares in the wide-format hybrid field, having been hard at work for over a decade in this field since its acquisition of Vutek.

“Vutek already had world class roll-to-roll products and they had just launched the PV200 and PV320 when we bought them. That was the time when digital really made a turn,” explains Paul Cripps, managing director and vice president of sales EMEA since May 2003.


He continues: “When you look at our hybrid products it is 100 percent capable of being a dedicated roll-to-roll product, with all of the productivity features seen on our dedicated systems. And then on the flatbed printing side, it has all the requirements needed to compete head to head with virtually any flatbed system.

O Factoid: The Vutek Press Vu PV200/600 is credited as being the first true mass market UV hybrid inkjet printing system. It offered six colours and white ink, and achieved 32.5sq m/h (250sq ft/h). The technology was launched shortly before Vutek’s sale to EFI.  O

“So, from that perspective it scales and allows any buyer to extend themselves into virtually any market that can be serviced. And it gives their sales people the ability to say ‘yes’.


“So, a customer could ask: ‘Can you print me a 150 meters of banners in 3.2m vinyl’ and the answer is yes. And then if the same customer asks: ‘Can you do me 50 rigid hoarding boards that are 2 x 3.2m’, then they can say yes again.

“The second element of this, and it is the strength of the Vutek, is the ability to move from one media to the next media without any downtime, hassle, or machine recalibration. Going from printing on vinyl one minute to wood the next is a powerful asset.”

Cripps explains there is a big difference between the profile of large accounts in North America and Europe. There are a few major print houses in Europe, but there are relatively a lot more smaller companies that produce a lot of metres of vinyl, but have restrictions on space, especially in European cities. So, they have difficult decisions to make in terms of what is going to fill up their floor space. It has to be a highly productive system that gives them the maximum amount of flexibility and the opportunity to cover any and all work that comes their way. As such, Cripps says a rough estimate is that the majority of its customers in Europe split their hybrid machines between running 60 percent rigid and 40 percent flexible work.

Looking to its portfolio, one of its leading lights is the Vutek LX3 Pro, which achieves 215sq m/h in production mode, while in express mode hits 318sq m/h. The aforementioned GS3250/LX Pro and HS100/125 Pro models are also very important contenders and worth your serious consideration in this high productivity segment.


Lamborghini lifestyle

Now, with that interesting statistic in mind comes the final member of our trio. Durst have likewise seen the continued value for customers that are crammed into city-based shops or small industrial estates around Europe, but have very healthy order sheets, in being able to swap between flatbed and roll-to-roll printing. 

Its key offering in this regards is its Rho P10 series, which scales from the 160 at 100sq m/h to the 200/250 HS at 350sq m/h. Although unavailable for comment on its current development plans, it is for certain they will continue to perform well with its ‘Lamborghini style’ approach to the market—selling low volumes of very highly specified machinery.

Indeed, its latest Quadro Array 10 printhead technology means it can maintain 1000dpi print quality at the very top speed of its P10 series. The same goes when its 200/250 HS tops out at 350sq m/h, it stays at a claimed 1,000dpi.



Indeed, as Durst’s product literature indicates, the USP of this technology is for those with a specifc specialisation that requires industrially repeatable quality: “Durst’s inkjet defines the new quality standard for industrial print production by combining speed and quality without compromising on either.”

What sits at the heart of this finely tuned thoroughbred technology is Durst’s Magnetic Linear Drive, which is accurate to a tolerance of 2microns, 10pl print heads, its Variodrop ink technology for banding elimination, and LED UV pin curing.

Another important point raised by one of its competitors interviewed above is Durst has the heaviest and most industrially built chassis available, and that means it can ultimately offer you the highest levels of quality at comparable speeds to its peers. Of course, that will come at a price tag that is justifiable if you have a specific requirement where you need this total precision.

So, there you have it. My honest advice for those constrained by space of overall capital investment budgets and with an ambition to retain roll-to-roll productivity in-house, while diversifying into flatbed printing, would do well to spend your time investigating the technology discussed above. Remember, it is always better long-term to invest in technology that will take you where you where you want to go, not allow you to cope with where you are now.


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