drupa 2024 got off to a flying start the day before the show officially opened on May 28, with Heidelberg and Canon holding a press conference to announce the two industry heavyweights have agreed to partner with each other on new, B3 digital inkjet technologies. This collaboration will see Canon’s portfolio expand into the industrial B3 market and add to Heidelberg’s line-up in a move that they say will allow them to provide ‘technology-neutral advice’ to their customers on the best technology to employ, reports Robyn Frampton, who is covering the show for Labels Plus.
Canon’s Jennifer Kolloczek, Senior Director Marketing & Innovation, Production Print, Canon EMA, said: “This drupa comes at a pivotal moment, where we can see the vast potential – not only how far we have come, but how far we can go in sustainable business development.”
She noted that print had a physical presence and impact that cannot be matched by other media, and said it was through the ‘intelligent combination’ of technologies – collaboration and integration – that will move businesses forward, future-proof print service provider businesses, and influence the way brands and content owners bring their products to market in future.
The introduction of the industrial-level digital inkjet VarioPRESS iV7, which will join the B3 Canon VarioPRINT iX3200, is a significant development for Canon Production Printing (CPP). Peter Wolff, Chief Marketing Officer & Senior Vice President for Canon Production Printing, described it as the ‘ultimate B2 digital production factory’. Operating at an impressive 8700 B2 4/0 sph, equivalent to 4.5 billion B2 sheets/month, it promises higher productivity, fewer operator interventions, increased production and reduced costs. It can print on a wide range of media up to 450 gsm, coated and uncoated, at full speed, delivering ultra-high quality using a new, water-based polymer pigment ink.
Heidelberg and CPP will cooperate on sales and service with Canon selling under the VarioPRESS brand, and Heidelberg under the Jetfire brand.
Heidelberg says the move has come because ‘we listen to our customers’ – the demand for industrial digital sheetfed is there. The company is releasing the Jetfire 50 B3 digital press to be available from drupa onwards, with the Jetfire 75 B2 sheetfed digital inkjet model (the Canon iV7) to be available for sale from mid-2025, with first installations expected early 2026. (Canon is talking a similar timeframe, though perhaps expecting to get the first presses in later Q3 or Q4 2025).
The press/es will be fully integrated into each company’s respective ecosystems: Prinect workflow with Touch Free technology delivering fully automated production which Wolff says will be economically optimised in real time – and for Canon, their Prinergy workflow solution.
For Heidelberg, the press conference also included a formal handover from outgoing CEO Ludwin Mons who said the show was a pinnacle of his career with Heidelberg, to Jurgen Otto, who talked a little about his background in the auto industry, the operational similarities in manufacturing presses, and the strength of the company and in particular the loyalty and relationships it has with its customers over the past 174 years.
Dr David Schmedding, Chief Sales & Service Officer took the lead on introducing the Canon partnership and new digital inkjet products, while Takia Von der Goltz, CFO, said the company achieved 2.4 billion Euro in sales last year – the same as the year before, despite the increasing costs of doing business. In fact, she said they had the best cashflow result for a decade in the 2023-24 FY, and also mentioned that the Asia-Pacific region is particularly strong.
In other news, the Canon stand will feature the LabelStream LS 2000, their first water-based inkjet label production system, printing CMYK+W on self-adhesive substrates (inks are food safety standard compliant), and will also be introducing their Canon Corrugated concept – a single-pass, industrial scale printer for corrugated cardboard that will be 1.7m wide and operate at 8000 m²/h delivering offset-like quality.
In wide format, they will showcase a UV Gel packaging factory based on the Colorado M-Series featuring digital converting – the ‘digital equivalent of lithographic lamination’. They’ll be featuring the M5-W, with white printing and FLY finishing (which can do gloss and matte areas on the same print without varnish) to provide ‘on-demand flexibility’. The machine will feature Fotoba Jumbo roll media input and output units.
Finally, Canon is introducing FLXture, a new, five-ink layer technology that can add micro-texture for surface detail and is available on new machines or via software upgrades to existing customers.
Caption:
Darren Brookes (left) and Dierk Wissmann, Heidelberg Australia, in front of the new Jetfire 50
Click here for more information on the Jetfire 50; click here for more information on the VarioPRESS iV7