Printing World articles from April 2000

Printing World archives from April 2000

Gowlett new chief at Coates.
April 3, 2000... Coates Lorilleux, for some months apparently leaderless and rudderless in the wake of its acquisition by Sun Chemical from Total, has a new leader. And, to the pleasure of the headquarters staff at St Mary Cray in Kent, the appointment is a...

Grange creates a Komori powerhouse.
April 3, 2000... Grange Press, a Wyndeham Press Group magazine printer, is set to become the UK's powerhouse of Komori Lithrone 440SP printing when it commissions a record third machine in the summer. This brings the company's spend with Komori to #4.5m since...

Halcyon's big step in its direct mail reincarnation.
April 3, 2000... Halcyon, formerly Waddington Business Forms, is to invest #3m in its direct mail division and has brought in new management as it continues to shrug off its image as a business forms printer. The Adare Group company was renamed as WBF a few...

LCP launches Internet training.
April 3, 2000... The London College of Printing has launched LCP, a new training initiative which it will deliver via the Internet. Designed in collaboration with major employers and industry partners, courses go online this month with what the LCP describes as...

Ingenious touch screen.
April 3, 2000... Fujifilm Graphic Systems has launched Kiosk, an ingenious touch screen system which will allow photographic prints to be sold on demand at high street newspaper offices. The public will be able to obtain pictures from the newspaper's own...

Dauphin says its DGM 435-3 is a mean ink machine.
April 3, 2000... The US company Dauphin Graphic Machines has launched a new web press which is claimed to offer printers major savings on ink consumption. The DGM 435-3 is also claimed to meet demands from newspaper publishers for back-to-back colour and fast...

Suppliers throw lifeline to Dorling Kindersley.
April 3, 2000... The printers and other suppliers to the troubled publisher Dorling Kindersley have extended a lifeline with an emergency credit facility of #23m until June 30. This comes just as its loan agreement with Barclays Bank expires. Although the...

AVT floats well in Germany.
April 3, 2000... Advanced Vision Technology has completed a successful introduction to the Frankfurter Neuer Markt, the German listing for smaller new technology companies. Its shares were placed at E14, the higher end of expectations, but even so, strong...

Colour Quest.
April 3, 2000... Hemel Hempstead printer Colour Quest is planning a move into ctp, and points out that it has no connection with Colour Quest Graphic Services, Tunbridge Wells as reported in Legals this week.

IN&M achieves record sales at E1.17bn.
April 3, 2000... Independent News & Media, the Irish newspaper and media group with interests in the UK, Australia, New Zealand and South Africa has announced record turnover of E1.17bn for the year to December 31. This compares with E799m in 1998, an increase...

Jacobson takes over KPG as Stewart steps away.
April 3, 2000... Mark Stewart, chief executive of Kodak Polychrome Graphics since its formation in 1998, has left the company. A statement from KPG says he will be "pursuing other business interests". His replacement is Jeff Jacobson who became senior vice...

Cornwall Litho put up for sale by the Cragos.
April 3, 2000... Cornwall Lithographic Printers in Redruth is up for sale after 23 years of family ownership. Owners Peter and Lynn Crago plan to retire from the sheetfed commercial printer, which has 34 staff, once a buyer comes forward. "Everything has...

Fire severely damages Duncan Web Offset press.
April 3, 2000... Two fire engines were called out to Duncan Web Offset, Maidstone, to fight a fire that broke out on one of its presses. Although the Health & Safety Executive says it was a relatively minor incident, firefighters were at the scene for almost...

Aylesford donations.
April 3, 2000... Aylesford Newsprint, a long time supporter of the world famous Great Ormond Street Hospital for Sick Children in London, has clocked up #100,000 of donations. Aylesford Newsprint donates 40p for every tonne of paper collected through its...

Kevin Martin to lead Bookmarque operation.
April 3, 2000... Kevin Martin will be appointed managing director of the new Fulmar Group paperback book printing venture later this year. Mr Martin, a veteran of St Ives and Pillans & Wilson, who is currently heading the valuable report & accounts work with...

Adast gears up to meet its 10-press November target.
April 3, 2000... Czech manufacturer Adast is spending #3.5m and taking on an additional 350 staff as it gears up to build the new direct imaging PAX press that will be sold by Xerox. The company expects to produce the first ten presses by November and will have...

XY-15 Plus scanner from Agfa.
April 3, 2000... Agfa has launched the AgfaScan XY-15Plus which almost doubles the scanning speed of the original XY-15 launched in 1999. The XY zoom technology gives maximum performance anywhere on the oversize A3 frame, and the new unit offers a wide range of...

T-Wave internal solution will stir thermal market.
April 3, 2000... Gretag Imaging, the company which now owns Cymbolic Sciences, claims to have solved the problems of imaging thermal plates with an internal drum platesetter. The first trial sites with the PlateJet T-wave are now in operation with the...

Lisburn firm moves wide with Idanit.
April 3, 2000... The first Idanit Novo in Ireland has been installed at Alexander Boyd Displays near Belfast, which says the new press means it can compete with wide-format digital and screenprinters as far afield as Scotland and Dublin. "I first saw the...

RPM's Mutoh, six-colours and up to 1m wide.
April 3, 2000... RPM Reprographics in Chichester has chosen to buy a little-known Mutoh inkjet printer in response to demand for wide-format posters, architectural plans and exhibition banners. The six-colour Mutoh can print up to 1m wide on paper, canvas or...

Faster set-ups mean a Heidelberg win in Notts.
April 3, 2000... Heidelberg has won out over Komori at a Nottingham printer which was seeking automation and fast makeready on a restricted budget. Hickling & Squires, an existing B2 Komori customer, is this week installing a Heidelberg SM 74 five-colour with...

GTOs into iGTOs.
April 3, 2000... A Californian company is taking old GTOs and turning them into iGTOs. The presses come with clear polyconnedburate side panels in iMac colours.The press was launched on Saturday at a surfing beach party. "This is an Internet ready machine,"...

E-commerce print site adds tracking.
April 3, 2000... Sheffield Internet print service printbynet.com is adding a online tracking service to its printing resource having redesigned its website. David Howarth, managing director of the service which was launched in August last year, says that...

Dotgain to serve book sector online.
April 3, 2000... Dotgain.co.uk, claiming to be the first and only online resource for the book production sector, will launch on April 10. Dotgain is described as a "magazine" with news and views from the book manufacturing industry putting book publishers and...

New team at Dixon & Roe.
April 3, 2000... Bunzl Fine Paper has appointed a new management team at the company's Dixon & Roe division, following chairman Peter Kenny's move to focus on other roles in the national distribution group. Mr Kenny will continue as chairman of Mason's Paper,...

Friary Press nears 100% ctp operation this month.
April 3, 2000... Friary Press expects to be all computer to plate by mid-April. By then, its second Lotem 800 will have passed its commissioning checks and the last Dolev 800 will be switched off. The move will cap an intensive 12 month investment programme...

Polestar contract.
April 3, 2000... The popularity of the BBC's Robot Wars series is good news for Polestar Colchester. It has won the contract to print the programme's monthly magazine which was launched last month. The first edition of the 24pp title has recently rolled off the...

Walsall moves to offer flexo gold or silver.
April 3, 2000... When Walsall Litho reviewed its burgeoning export market and found that its customers were increasingly demanding flexo coating, the company again decided to open its capital investment purse strings. Now installed and answering the twin demand...

Chris King switches to Haymarket.
April 3, 2000... Chris King, group production manager at Reed Business Information, Sutton, left the company last week to take up a new appointment as group production director at Haymarket Publishing. Martin Bloomfield, Reed Information operations director,...

COMMENT: Where have all the people gone?
April 3, 2000... At 5.05pm one evening last week, I tried to ring one of this country's leading ink organisations. I failed. I was slapped over the wrists for daring to communicate with this company at such a late hour. I tried several of the company's...

More carton expansion.
April 3, 2000... Norway: Akerlund & Rausing, the packaging printing and manufacturing group originally founded in Sweden, has further expanded. After the recent merger with Folding Carton Partners, the new name of the group is A&R Carton (annual world turnover...

Revived Life to die.
April 3, 2000... US: The venerable Life magazine, first published as a weekly in 1938 and famous for its use of brilliant images by world renowned photographers stopped publication in 1972, but was revived as a monthly. Sadly, the owner, Time-Warner, has...

French order for KBA.
April 3, 2000... France: The Government printing works, Imprimerie Nationale, has ordered a 64-page KBA Compacta 818 web offset press with a new V5 variable format folder system, proven on KBA rotogravure presses. Several other printers, including Quebecor in...

Compacta for Africa.
April 3, 2000... Algeria: The last major web offset presses sold to this troubled north African country, where most book and publication printing is state- controlled, arrived some 20 years ago. However, now the Government has ordered a publication printing...

Closed loop system.
April 3, 2000... US: One of the printing works of Sandy Alexander is claiming to operate the first full closed-loop colour control system and "instrument flying" in US web offset. A Rotoman 2002 web offset press has had its colour control system expanded by...

Stillachem starts work.
April 3, 2000... Israel: NUR Macroprinters, the manufacturer of wide and superwide format digital printing systems, today announced that its 50% owned subsidiary, Stillachem, has commenced operations and has begun manufacturing inks for the NUR Fresco...

Product of the year.
April 3, 2000... US: Vutek, the manufacturer of super-wide format digital printers, has been awarded the accolade of DPI Product of the Year 2000 for its UltraVu 2360 SC six-colour digital printer. Vutek won top honours at the annual conference of the...

Nilpeter website.
April 3, 2000... Denmark: Nilpeter, the manufacturer of presses for the label sector, has opened the way to faster, easier access to information for its customers and business partners with the introduction of a website at www.nilpeter.com. In its initial form,...

Bertelsmann's billions.
April 3, 2000... Germany: The media giant Bertelsmann says it has up to #23.6bn to spend on acquisitions in Europe and the US. The money comes from Bertelsmann's sale of its stake in two online ventures to partner AOL. The group has intimated that it is looking...

Quebecor dials success.
April 3, 2000... Canada: Quebecor Printing has announced it has won a big contract extension valued at more than $735m to continue to produce phone directories for Pacific Bell Directory. Quebecor merged with World Color last October and is changing its name to...

Primesetter, son of Herkules, offers a computer to film option.
April 3, 2000... In response to what it sees as the slow market take-up of ctp, Heidelberg is launching a new computer to film device. The Primesetter series is the successor to the Herkules imagesetter, and for Heidelberg, it represents a concerted attack on...

North London transatlantic alliance.
April 3, 2000... A north London printer is teaming up with a New York company in a transatlantic print alliance forged over the Internet. The Forrest Press, Edmonton, London N15, was discovered by Hudson after its chief executive officer Alan Bergmann began...

E-print service hunts for UK managing director.
April 3, 2000... New England e-commerce print service printconnect.net is looking for a managing director to head its UK operation as the company seeks to roll out its relationship based service across the globe. The UK and German offices will be in place for a...

Petty upgrades Leeds finishing operation.
April 3, 2000... Polestar Petty is upgrading its finishing department with a #1.2m spend. It is installing a Muller Martini 300 saddlestitching line and also enhancing three of its five existing lines. The Muller Martini line is fitted with an Onyx...

Inprint Systems wins damages in Italian action over battery labels.
April 3, 2000... Inprint Systems, the Ashford label systems supplier, which litigiously protects its miniature label patents round the globe has been in legal action again. In a court in Milan, Inprint Systems has won damages and costs against two companies,...

Moore Paragon contract.
April 3, 2000... The future is looking safe for Moore Paragon after winning a #7.5m contract with Securicor Omega Express. The Sunderland printer will be providing a number of documents as well as preprinted and barcode labels for the delivery company over the...

London Book Fair breaks all previous records.
April 3, 2000... This year's London Book Fair claims to have broken all records set in its 30 year history with a 14% increase in both exhibitors and visitors. Visitor attendance has grown from 12,922 in 1999 to 14,184 this year, with 30% from overseas. The...

H&S under close examination at Inveresk.
April 3, 2000... Inveresk claims to be on target to achieve its health and safety goals by putting every member of staff through certified exams. By spring of next year, employees at Inveresk's five mills - four in Scotland and one in Wells, Somerset - will...

Ctp, Agfa's `market of the future' zooms 45%.
April 3, 2000... In unveiling its results for 1999, the Belgian consumables giant Agfa Gevaert has once again illustrated the importance of its Graphic Systems operation which now accounts for E1.9bn or 40% of the group's total sales. In particular, sales in...

CP Graphics takes on Zirkon in UK.
April 3, 2000... Zirkon, the German web press manufacturer, has a new UK agent in CP Graphics, which has taken over from Geliot Hurner Ewen. Based in Leipzig in the former East Germany, Zirkon was the first manufacturer to produce a commercial 8pp web press in...

Surplex.com goes live this week with Brian in charge.
April 3, 2000... Former UK boss of Global Graphics, Andrew Brian, is the latest print boss to join an online venture. Mr Brian has been hired as chief executive officer of Surpex.com, a printing industry portal that goes live on Thursday, April 6. Surpex is...

Graphics firm moves back to film (for the discount).
April 3, 2000... Despite the hype for ctp throughout the prepress world, much of Australia's enthusiasm is - at best - one of theory. A case in point is the newspaper sector which is yet to dip its toe into the ctp pond. At the same time, a leading prepress...

The making of a Marque.
April 3, 2000... The announcement of Bookmarque caused some ripples. Mike Taylor explains to TERRY ULRICK his philosophy for paperback printing in the UK Mike Taylor of the Fulmar Group is one of the few publicly quoted companies in the printing sector. The...

A Cossar in Crieff - history for sale.
April 3, 2000... The oldest town centre business in Crieff, to the west of Perth in Scotland, is David Philips Printers - now up for sale. And as a result of this decision by the fourth generation proprietor of this old established printing firm, a piece of...

Elements buys second Scottish digital printer.
April 3, 2000... Elements, the prepress and digital printing group, has strengthened its presence in Scotland by buying up a second digital printing business in Scotland less than a year after it bought its first. Elements, which is owned by the US company...

Gambian appeal for a Kord press.
April 3, 2000... A plea is being made to the British printing industry to maintain a lifeline for some of the most desperate people in Africa. Gambia's equivalent of the Big Issue, which saves many unemployed youngsters from drug dealing or prostitution, is...

Excalibur Finishers spends to stamp its mark on foiling sector.
April 3, 2000... It is not often today that a company goes into foil stamping, and perhaps rarer still to find one that claims to be doing well. Excalibur Finishers in Croydon, set up with funding from Alexir Packaging of Crawley last June, started with a...

Comco on show.
April 3, 2000... Comco, the Swiss company that has decided not to exhibit at Drupa 2000, is holding a series of seminars during April at its Kradolf showroom facility near Zurich. So far, 70 delegates have booked a seminar place to see the Comco ProGlide MSP...

IBD orders 31 Purup-Eskofot ctp systems.
April 3, 2000... The placing of a #6.5m order for ctp devices by Investor's Business Daily could signal a major turning point for ctp within the newspaper sector. Purup-Eskofot, in winning an order for a total of 31 ctp devices, could have bought to an end the...

Goodbye to that difficult M&S green.
April 3, 2000... The fightback has begun at Marks & Spencer, with the most drastic rebranding in the company's history. Gold, serif lettering is out, replaced by more modern typefaces and "a family of greens" for M&S's packaging and plastic bags. The new...

Biovox system will keep sea breezes fresh at St Leonards.
April 3, 2000... A manufacturer of hot stamping foils at the Sussex holiday playground resort of St Leonards is doing its bit to keep the sea breezes as fresh as ever. Surrey Roll Leaf is in the process of installing the first Biovox bacteriological abatement...

Booth Group signs Charter.
April 3, 2000... The Henry Booth Group in Hull has signed up with the local branch of the GPMU to the BPIF/GPMU Training & Development Charter, the national initiative that commits employers to providing a quality training programme. New Polaroid sales...

LEGALS.
April 3, 2000... Compulsory winding up * The following cases are due to be heard at the Royal Courts of Justice, Strand, London WC2A Colour Quest Graphic Services Ltd Ashton House, 4 Dudley Road, Tunbridge Wells, Kent on April 12 at 10.30am. Petition...

Aluminium plate price rises on the way.
April 3, 2000... A steep rise in aluminium prices is threatening to push up plate prices, after years of low metal prices and cheaper and cheaper plates. For suppliers of offset plates, aluminium represents between 50%-60% of total manufacturing costs, and all...

Moore Corp in bad form.
April 3, 2000... The continuing decline of business forms has dented Moore Corporation, the giant Canadian forms group, which has warned that it could make a loss of between US$6m and US$10m this quarter. Although results will not be formally released until...

Germany's digital difference.
April 3, 2000... Some 13% of German printers now have digital presses, putting them well ahead of their British counterparts. According to some estimates, less than 1% of British commercial printers have digital presses so far, and only 12% of all realisable...

Online ad revenue up.
April 3, 2000... Online advertising revenues doubled last year, growing from #7.9m in the first half of 1998 to #17.3m in the first half of 1999 - a 122% increase. However, according to the research by PricewaterhouseCoopers much of this increased revenue is...

X-Rite seeks Mr Right.
April 3, 2000... X-Rite, the US supplier of colour management systems, has signalled that it is on the lookout for acquisitions and new partners by hiring Broadview International, an investment bank, as its financial advisor. "Our alliance with Broadview will...

Manufacturers fume on gas.
April 3, 2000... Papermakers and other manufacturing industries have warned that higher gas prices could prove to be the final straw for some companies on top of the strong pound. The Energy Intensive Users' Group, which includes papermakers, says that gas...

New press discounts devastate the used pricing structure.
April 3, 2000... The used printing machinery sector has historically been made up of several types of supplier. There is the broker who often works from home, who possesses good knowledge of machines and the industry generally, who promotes himself as nothing...

Specialisation reaps dividends for Dornier.
April 3, 2000... Dornier Printing Machinery's decision to specialise purely in used Heidelberg sheetfed presses has, says the company, reaped dividends. The company has been structured in three divisions - press sales, engineering and transport, while for the...

Internet brings extra business to PG&M.
April 3, 2000... Printing & Graphic Machinery at Bourne End in Buckinghamshire is totally enthusiastic about its www.pgm.co.uk website. More and more enquiries leading to more and more sales has been the name of the game in the past 12 months. "Every day...

More printers taking the big step up.
April 3, 2000... Knight Graphic Equipment is detecting a new attitude among printers going for a press upgrade. For the past 12 months, companies have been showing an increasing willingness to leap up to four-colour presses and to those with sophisticated press...

New factory and offices for optimistic Atlas Machinery.
April 3, 2000... Still under wraps, but nearing completion, is the reconstruction of the Wakefield factory of Atlas Machinery. A new 3,500 sq ft office complex and new factory buildings will be officially opened later in the spring. The new offices will...

Another two big names for BUPMSA.
April 3, 2000... The British Used Printing Machinery Suppliers' Association is growing, both in membership and influence. Recent new members include Knight Graphic Equipment and Exel Graphic Services. Exel joint managing director Brenda Jones says she believed...

Graphic West offers painless purchases.
April 3, 2000... Graphic West Machinery is poised to install its first Roland 700 press - a 705+L into Ruscombe Printing of Reading in Berkshire. The relationship between Graphic West and Ruscombe began three years ago when Graphic West was commissioned to...

Adding the feminine touch.
April 3, 2000... Here is living proof of a quest by Brenda Jones, joint managing director of Exel Graphic Services, Crayford, to add a feminine touch to what she describes as the rough diamond used machinery sector. Dawn Kelley (left) has been brought in from...

Upex 2000 moves onwards and upward.
April 3, 2000... The first Upex - the used printing machinery show - was held in September, 1995 which was a Drupa year. Now the sixth Upex is again taking place in another Drupa year and the organisers are anticipating an exceptionally busy show as a result of...

DPM sells first used Roland 305.
April 3, 2000... DPM of Biggin Hill in south east London has sold the first used Roland 305 to Blade Colour, Aylesbury. The 1997 machine which was sourced from MAN Roland in Germany, is a high spec model with cpl, Autoplate and double perfector. Other DPM...

Rusty shell to pristine press.
April 3, 2000... Knight Graphic Equipment has once again totally refurbished a severely damaged press. Last year it was a press that had taken a tumble from a lorry and this year it has been a five-colour B1 Komori horrendously damaged by fire. The press...

Sprinting north of the Firth of Forth.
April 3, 2000... In goes what is believed to be the most northerly installed automated Komori press in the UK. The two-colour Komori Sprint is seen swinging into Multiprint in Kirkcaldy in Scotland which, for the uninitiated, is north of the Firth of Forth. The...

150 machines in stock at Grafitec.
April 3, 2000... At its main 25,000 sq ft refurbishment factory in Wakefield, and elsewhere within the group, Grafitec now has over 150 machines in stock dedicated to print finishing and bookbinding. Stock includes Muller Martini stitching lines, 15...

Mann Redfern's VIP Didde.
April 3, 2000... Mann Redfern of Crigglestone, Wakefield, is currently offering from stock a Didde VIP eight-colour press which is fitted with uv drying for direct mail production. The company is also offering a Miyakoshi six- colour also with uv drying. ...

The whole package.
April 3, 2000... Nyland Graphics is out to change the image of used machinery dealers, both here and abroad. MARION WILSON takes a trip to Derby When John Nyland set up Nyland Graphics with his son Steve 11 years ago, they were determined to bring their own...