MGI has confirmed that fellow French company ISRA has arranged to take delivery the world’s first AlphaJet B1 digital embellishment printer.
ISRA, which is based in the Drôme department, is a commercial printer that employs more than 90 people at its premies in Romans. It signed the order for its new machine in December 2021, with installation set to take place in April this year.
Previewed as far back as drupa 2012, when its ambitions were more modest, and expected to be launched at drupa 2020, the AlphaJet is described by MGI as a ‘breakthrough innovation in industrial printing’ which integrates in a single pass ‘all stages of CMYK printing, spot UV varnish and hot foil stamping, in fixed or variable data, in 2D and 3D, in a B1 format’.
ISRA says that installing the AlphaJet, which is part of the wider five year ‘France Relance’ innovation plan, confirms not only its dedication to printing but also to innovation and differentiation. General manager Jean-Pierre Chauvin explained, ‘ISRA is a very specific company, which masters internally all the printing trades, in particular offset printing, screen printing, digital printing, hot foil stamping, printed electronics and security printing.
‘These different trades allow us to offer products with high added value, by their printing quality, their personalisation, their finishing, whether they are classic or embed contactless technologies. Today, the manufacturing of our products generally requires five main steps. The AlphaJet will allow us to simplify the production flow and to free us from certain printing constraints, without breaking loads, without waste and without loss of time, with an unequalled productivity, impossible to obtain with conventional equipment.’
Christophe Jouinot, president and director of production at ISRA, added that the arrival of the AlphaJet would herald a ‘technical revolution’ for his company. He added, ‘Until now, the implementation of different equipment to realize our packagings and our cards, had for consequence incompressible production times, minimal volumes, even the management of semi-finished products. The AlphaJet will enable us to gain in reactivity, but also in quality, because of an exceptional quadri printing on a great number of supports, in photo quality, and a perfect register of the varnish and the hot gilding. Freed from various production breaks, we will be able to offer very short production times, on all types of prints, with eco-responsible products with high added value.’
Speaking from the manufacturers point of view Edmond Abergel, CEO of MGI, stressed how the press would fit in well with ISRA’s innovative ethos. ‘During our first exchanges with the ISRA teams, we were surprised by the very strong innovation DNA that carried the dynamics of the company,’ the CEO said. ‘And by its implementation by a team of experts of conventional technologies, very different from each other. At the end of a process of thorough tests and trials, these are the experts who validated the acquisition of the AlphaJet.’
