This being a drupa year we’re expecting all sorts of new technologies to be presented in Düsseldorf in May. And not to be outdone, Fespa in Amsterdam is the site of a bevy of new technologies this month. Ricoh will introduce a new flatbed roll-to-roll printer and there will be many more new products to explore. There is certainly no lack of innovation, but we aren’t seeing enough being done when it comes to sustainability developments.

The problem isn’t so much with commercial print waste, since most of this is still paper based. Paper recycling is well-established in developed economies and although the paper industry is slacking when it comes to digital print deinking and recycling investments, the model is at least there. At some point the necessary upgrades will be made.

Press technologies are also readily recycled and here too a model is in place. Ricoh, Canon, HP and Xerox have long since reused skins and other components from devices they have reclaimed for reuse. And printing presses have very long lifespans, assuming parts and consumables are still available. But more seriously we have new inks and substrates that cannot always be easily parted. This compromises paper recycling and will undermine the considerable advances made in the industry’s environmental sustainability in the last few years. That said, in the commercial print sector we have an established foundation and supply chains for improved sustainability. The same cannot truly be said for the packaging sector where innovation, particularly in materials science may be spurring more problems than it solves.

In the last few years we have seen some gorgeous innovations in shapes and sizes of packaging, thanks to innovation in substrates, inks and packaging systems. There has been a trend towards smaller packages and multipacks, packages within packages which suits the market but drives excess packaging consumption. This inevitably generates waste, much of which gets burned rather than being put into established recycling streams.

According to data from the European Union (EU), each European generated an average of over 188kg of packaging waste, ranging from 73.8kg per person in Croatia to more than 246kg per person in Ireland. The EU’s goal is to recycle 70% of packaging waste by 2030, from all sources but perhaps we shouldn’t be generating so much of it in the first place. That is much easier said than done, but as with judicious use of print which is now a commonplace, we can all think more carefully about the packaging waste we generate. 

Laurel Brunner

This article was produced by the Verdigris Project, an industry initiative intended to raise awareness of print’s positive environmental impact. This weekly commentary helps printing companies keep up to date with environmental standards, and how environmentally friendly business management can help improve their bottom lines. Verdigris is supported by the following companies: Agfa Graphics, EFI, Fespa, Fujifilm, HP, Kodak, Miraclon, Ricoh, Unity Publishing and Xeikon.

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The company, which recently added a Canon iX 3200 sheet-fed inkjet press to its fleet, has now acquired Xerox Iridesse and Versant 4100 digital dry toner presses, plus Xerox FreeFlow Core and FreeFlow Vision workflow software. The Iridesse will add new capabilities such as foil-like effects, iridescent hues, and fluorescent colour capability that can help capture mail recipients’ attention. FreeFlow Core will enhance prepress automation, integrating with CFH’s back office and the recently announced FreeFlow Vision Software. This software provides automate, real-time data on production print operations within Xerox and third-party environments.

‘Investing in class-leading Xerox workflows and technology, particularly the additional functionality of the Iridesse, will give new and existing clients more choice and effectiveness in their communications while adding value to our capabilities as we pursue market opportunities,’ commented CFH group production director Steve Cray.

“For over 20 years, CFH has chosen Xerox innovation to complement its growth and commitment to delivering exceptional communication solutions. This investment in the wider Xerox ecosystem leverages leading-edge Xerox technologies and automated workflows that deliver even better service and innovation to clients and prospects,’ said Nick Bridge, general manager of graphic communications and productions systems at Xerox UK.

CFH has recently celebrated its 45^th anniversary as a provider of secure printing. Its Docmail hybrid mail solution is used by over 30,000 organisations. The company says the new investment signals the next phase in the its transformation into a multi-channel communications provider.

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Branding the changes as a ‘reinvention’, Xerox CEO Steven Bandrowczak said in a Xerox statement, ‘The shift to a business unit operating model is a continuation of our client-focused, balanced execution priorities and is designed to accelerate product and services, go-to-market, and corporate functions’ operating efficiencies across all geographies we serve.’

Within the core print business, the plan is to simplify the product range while increasing investment in a ‘partner-enabled go-to-market model’ and the pursuit with partners of ‘strategic market share gains’ by means of ‘increasing reach, improving cost to serve, and enhancing profitability’. What this means for Xerox’s offerings in the commercial print sector is not clear, but it is perhaps noteworthy that no significant new product introductions have been made here since the 2019 launch of the Baltoro sheet-fed inkjet press, following 2018’s launch of the popular Iridesse six-colour dry toner production press. The Baltoro was updated in 2020 to increase its substrate flexibility via an additional drying unit, and new low-end and mid-production toner presses introduced.

At Hunkeler Innovationdays 2023, Xerox was the only digital press vendor present not to have a digital web press, having retired the Trivor and Brenva models and showing only the Baltoro. Further to the ending of the Fuji-Xerox agreement it no longer has exclusivity on the Iridesse platform, which was manufactured under the joint agreement and now faces competition from Fujifilm’s own Revoria line, which became available in the UK in April 2023.

The new Global Business Services unit is described in vague terms but appears to be targeted predominantly at existing corporate and enterprise customers. It too seems to be relying on simplification and lowered transaction costs, with generic promises about improving quality for both clients and employees via continuous improvement.

The IT and digital services unit is intended to ‘accelerate revenue diversification toward markets with higher growth and profitability profiles’. This presumably builds on the Care AR and related software products that were introduced in 2022 and which were featured at Hunkeler in February 2023, along with FreeFlow Vision workflow and analytics software. In an autumn 2022 presentation, Mr Bandrowczak also noted that AI techniques which had already been implemented in the Baltoro press would be further diversified into support for production printing. It is not clear if this will continue; nor is it immediately apparent where the July 2022 acquisition of direct mail specialist Go Inspire sits within the new structure.

Darren Cassidy, managing director UK & Ireland, and SVP EMEA enterprise at Xerox, told Digital Printer, ‘With our new operating model, we will simplify our print offerings and stay aligned with what our clients are solving for in today’s workplace, whether that be home, office or production print environments. That also includes investments in software and services to pursue strategic market share gains and increase reach with partners, while reducing costs and improving profitability.

‘For more than a century, Xerox has been a technology pioneer, continually redefining the workplace experience. As our business evolves, we will continue to prioritise innovation and deliver the best possible hardware, software, and services for our clients and partners.’

To support the new model various changes in the leadership team at Xerox have been made. Effective immediately, John Bruno, president and CEO, will lead the enterprise alignment of  the print, digital services, and IT services businesses. Louie Pastor returns to Xerox as chief transformation & administrative officer, charged with overseeing the Xerox Reinvention Office and the newly-established Global Business Services organisation. Tracey Koziol, executive vice president of Global Offering Solutions and chief product officer who had responsibility for the professional print products, left at the end of 2023.

A 15% worldwide workforce reduction is expected to be implemented in the first quarter of 2024. No information was provided on how or where these job cuts will be made.

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FreeFlow Vision offers real-time at-a-glance visibility and control of production operations via a web-based interface. It uses advanced AI and machine learning technologies to boost productivity, particularly for clients with multiple production presses, including both Xerox and other manufacturers’ presses.

‘We are strengthening our partnership with Xerox by seamlessly integrating FreeFlow Vision software into our operations,’ said Simon Young, managing director at SF Taylor. ‘This marks a significant stride forward in our commitment to delivering unparalleled services to our clients. The efficiency enhancements gained through this collaboration will empower our clients with faster, more reliable services and contribute to our journey towards a more sustainable future by reducing resource consumption and waste.’

SF Taylor aims to adopt eco-friendly practices, and FreeFlow Vision aligns with this values by pinpointing problems, replicating efficiencies and optimising print processes, which should support SF Taylor in reducing both paper waste and energy consumption.

Nick Bridge, general manager of production systems and graphic communications at Xerox UK, said, ‘Our relationship with SF Taylor spans many years; they have always strived for operational excellence. This strategic investment in Xerox FreeFlow Vision, an integral part of our Production Eco-System, will provide real-time insights and data to drive an even more efficient operation.’

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What’s now called embellishment or special effects used to be a group of purely post-press operations. These included lamination, spot or flood varnishing and foiling (hot or cold). Other eye-catching things have always had to be done in or on the press – if you wanted metallic colours you had to use a special ink or print on a metallised substrate; the same applied for fluorescent or other special colours.

Digital print has blurred those boundaries, bringing a number of ways of achieving the same or ‘close enough’ effects, combined with the flexibility and minimal set-up requirements characteristic of digital print. These also split into in-press effects and subsequently-applied effects.

Before looking at these in detail, it’s also worth noting that a sustainability argument is emerging for digital embellishment as an alternative to more conventional processes. This comes from Scodix, which makes stand-alone ‘embellishment presses’ (distributed in the UK by Friedheim) that can apply a wide range of decorative effects to printed sheets, with full digital flexibility in each.

Scodix carried out a lifecycle assessment of its digital foiling options which found that compared to conventional hot stamp foiling, its version reduces CO2e (CO2 equivalent) by 85%, fossil fuel usage by nearly 85%, and water consumption by 80% per B1 sheet. The study, carried out by EcamRicert, and Mérieux NutriSciences Companies, compared the enhancement of a single B1 sheet through to 100,000 B1 sheets using Scodix foil (175g) versus traditional foiling methods.

That’s only one of the options that Scodix offers and there’s no indication given that any of the other supported techniques offer comparable advantages. However, like any other form of digital printing, it seems likely that overall wastage of materials and energy is likely to be lower simply through the ability to only print or finish the number required.

The main argument in favour of these types of effects though is that they add impact to printed products and therefore margin to your work. Some you can only do if you bought the right press, though they could also be a factor in choosing a new one. There’s an increasing number of toner presses that offer additional colours which may include clear ‘varnish’, white, fluorescent and metallic colours, though usually only one or sometimes two at a time.

Plus-one – or more

Machines that offer a fifth colour include Xerox’s iGen line and Ricoh’s Pro C7200, also sold by Heidelberg as the Versafire EV (and about to be replaced by the Pro C7500, though we’ve not seen any specification for this yet). Kodak’s Nexpress and Nexfinity models could do this too, with options over where in the laydown sequence the fifth colour went, though both are now discontinued. Moving up to six colours brings in the popular Xerox Iridesse, and the more recent Fujifilm Revoria, while most HP Indigos can handle up to seven colours, though of course click charges go up in proportion with all extra colour presses. Xerox also offers a conversion kit for two-pass printing on its entry-level PrimeLink C9065/C9070, which potentially allows the use of up to eight colours, albeit with a complete change of toner cartridges between passes.

The exact choice of extra colours varies by manufacturer, but in addition to white – for use on coloured or transparent substrates – and clear – used to create flood or spot varnish effects – fluorescent or ‘neon’ colours are offered, particularly pink and sometimes yellow. These can replace or be mixed with their standard CMYK equivalents to expand the colour gamut for more eye-catching effects. A few offer metallic toners too, which again can be printed solid or mixed to provide novel colours and finishes.

After the event

Post-press options are more about foiling, spot varnish and various creative lamination processes, often in combination. A good entry-level choice here is foil-over-toner, a two-pass method that uses ‘real’ foil in a laminator like Vivid’s Matrix models or those from Caslon, Foliant (sold via IFS), Komfi (from Friedheim) or Autobond. Similar options also come from GMP and Intec, now part of the Plockmatic group.

An entry-level option for foil-over-toner is Vivid’s Matrix, seen here at a trade show

In these, the initial colour print is first laminated with a clear film, then printed again with the foil pattern in black toner on top of the film, before a second pass through the laminator transfers the foil to the partially melted black toner. It’s a more labour-intensive process but it works with a very wide range of foil types and doesn’t require special consumables.

Then there are the fully ‘digital’ embellishment devices that offer spot UV and/or foiling in a single operation. This category includes devices like Duplo’s B2 DuSense 8000, which is offered in various configurations providing spot UV, digital foiling or both, including a pre-treatment option for expanding the types of print that can be handled. It’s also possible to build up textured ‘3D’ effects with multiple passes, which the smaller B3 DuSense 810 also supports. An alternative is the B3+ Konica Minolta AccurioShine 3600, which uses technology from MGI, in which Konica Minolta holds a significant stake. It too can produce ‘dimensional’ effects.

At the top end of the digital embellishment market are the ranges from Konica Minolta/MGI and Scodix. These are dedicated industrial production devices that offer UV varnish and foiling, with Scodix offering a particularly wide range of foils and finished effects, while MGI’s line goes up to B1 sheet size in the form of the print-and-embellish AlphaJet that was formally launched in October 2022. Kurz is another player at the industrial end of the scale, having bought Steinemann, whose inkjet varnish and foiling systems it was already marketing as Digital Metal. These include the sheet-fed B2 DM-Smartliner for 2D flat varnishing and foiling and the DM-Maxliner for raised and textured effects.

Whether you’re just ready to dip a toe into digital embellishment and cautious with the investment, or know that you’ve got a ready market for it but need to be sure it’s good enough and fast enough to meet your customers’ needs, there should be something to suit and help your work shine.

Preparing files for embellishment

All digital embellishment processes require ‘artwork’ to control where the effects are applied. Usually this means creating additional layers in the originating applications and/or print PDFs, though some vendors offer DFE-based tools to create embellishment guides or colour substitutions from standard PDFs on-the-fly.

Andrew Bailes-Collins of Ultimate Technographics, which makes imposition, nesting and ganging software, has written a handy guide to preparing generic PDFs that should process correctly through most embellishment vendors’ DFEs and thus avoid some of the common pitfalls that require manual reworking in the prepress studio.

Called PDF Creation for Digital Embellishment, it covers the use of spot colours, layers, knock-out and overprint and choice of correct versions of PDF for hand-off. It’s available free from Ultimate Technographics’ website.

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The investment is intended to streamline Go Inspire’s manufacturing processes, helping it deliver ‘better experiences, improved performance and new services’ to clients which include Sainsbury’s, the Royal National Lifeboat Institution (RNLI), Pizza Hut and Cruise. The implementation of web-to-print will allow the company to expand into the digital print and short-run offset market. Driven by XMPie software, the system will streamline small-run work, reducing costs and administrative efforts while expediting the manufacturing process.

According to Go Inspire, the investments in the web portal and the digital department mark a significant expansion in its commercial print services. The company will now be able to provide digital printing capabilities, enabling clients to self-serve for small lithographic and digital printing jobs, an option that was not previously available. A mezzanine floor has been added, bringing 3883sqft of space to its facilities to accommodate the digital presses and associated finishing equipment.

Danny Cook, group operations director at Go Inspire, commented, ‘We are thrilled about these investments and their potential to transform our manufacturing capabilities and expand our service offerings. We now have the ability to produce short run volumes, closing the gap in the ever-changing needs of our marketing clients, specifically with the addition of the Xerox Iridesse press, allowing us to provide customers with print enhancements including silver, gold, and fluorescent. The company remains committed to delivering exceptional print and marketing solutions that meet the evolving needs of our clients.’

The printing and finishing equipment aspect of the upgrade includes seven Xerox digital presses in total, with various Nuvera and Versant models, as wells the Iridesse. Enhancements to Kodak Prosper variable data hardware have also been made. Finishing and paper handling equipment from Stahl, Palamides and Komori, including a pallet-fed folder with robotic stacker, has also been added.

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The move is said to underscore Image Data’s commitment to innovation, automation and customer satisfaction. In addition to the Iridesse’s productivity features such as 120ppm print speed, the additional colour options allow imageData to offer an array of additional colours including white, clear, silver, gold, and fluorescent pink, all of which can be mixed with the regular CMYK, to bring increased vibrance and depth to printed work, as well as opening doors to more creative possibilities for its clients.

Jason Vivian, Image Data’s operations director, commented, ‘Our investment in the Xerox Iridesse not only signifies our dedication to remaining at the forefront of print technology, but also our commitment to adding value to our clients’ projects.

‘By delivering a broader spectrum of colours and enhanced automation, we are poised to expand our market presence and offer our clients a truly unparalleled printing experience. Image Data’s new venture with the Xerox Iridesse marks an exciting chapter for the company and further cements our status as an industry leader.’

Nick Bridge, general manager, Xerox Production, added, ‘Image Data’s true investment is not only in the press but in the wider Xerox ecosystem, which includes support, training and business development. The Xerox Iridesse is a revolutionary digital printing technology that offers an expanded colour range and is driven by highly advanced automation features, setting a new standard for print quality and efficiency in the modern era.’

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Mr Phillips and Ms Cole replace respectively Jon Wright and James Povery who had both reached the 10-year maximum tenure for trustees. Mr Phillips has worked at Paragon in various senior operational roles since 2006 and became chief operating officer  for the Paragon Customer Communications business in April 2023.

Ms Cole has worked with and for a variety of print-related companies including Xerox, Oki and HP, where she was heavily involved with the development of Dscoop EMEA. She has worked in a global role with brands, agencies, programmes and training courses, particularly in sales and sales training, and is currently a non-executive strategy consultant for the BPIF.

The new trustees are Catherine Cook, a qualified solicitor admitted in England, Wales and Scotland with over 26 years’ experience advising on corporate real estate transactions, including a period with Clifford Chance; Sam Hay, who has worked in health and social care for 30 years, and currently head of social care for specialist charity Mental Health Matters; and Si Mathavan, currently a partner at Johnston Carmichael, leading on risk assurance and internal audit. He is also involved in ESG and chairs the risk advisory working group for the international firm.

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Mr Mashis a former CEO of the British Coatings Federation, which serves the paint, wallpaper and printing ink industries in the UK. Born in Guildford, Surrey, he was educated at the Stationers’ Company’s School in London, read chemistry at University College London and gained an MBA after studying at Manchester Business School and the Institute Supérieure des Affaires in Paris. He spent 27 years with ICI and AstraZeneca in a range of international business development, procurement and change roles in the plastics, refrigeration gas, agrochemical and coatings sectors and later worked for British, American, Japanese and Australian companies and spent a total of 16 years working in the USA, where he took American citizenship.

He joined the Court of the Company in 2014 and has since chaired the Industry and the Marketing Advisory Committees. He is now the Treasurer of the Friends of the Stationers’ Foundation in the USA.

Meanwhile, a total of 18 companies have been shortlisted for the Stationers’ Company Innovation Excellence Awards 2023. Now in their ninth year, the awards were established to recognise innovation within the communications and content industries. They are sponsored by print industry body Picon and Mathys and Squire.

The awards have been judged by a panel of nine, who reviewed applications from novel products, services and business processes with a positive financial and ESG impact on customers and on the environment. Winners will be selected for Business Process, Communications Including Marketing, Customer Experience, Product Design, Service Development and Start-up.

The awards event will be held at a luncheon at Stationers’ Hall on 25 September 2023; nominees inlcude Rose Calendars, Xerox, Renz (UK) and Parkside Flexibles.

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The change sees Mr Kyprianou, managing director of Go Inspire CX, move into an overarching managing director role and join the Xerox EMEA Senior Leadership Team with immediate effect.

Mr Headley, who will continue with the business in a consultative role for the next 12 months before formally retiring, joined Go Inspire in 1993, six months after it was founded. He progressed through the business in a variety of roles, leading an MBO in 2016 and recently the purchase of Go Inspire by Xerox. During his tenure, the company grew into a £90 million turnover business with a 400-plus strong workforce across two offices in Leicester, and most recently a digital and customer experience (CX) hub in London.

Mr Kyprianou joined Go Inspire in 2021, focussing on reformulating the group proposition. He commented, ‘I am honoured to be given this opportunity. To carry forward the torch, building on Pat’s legacy and embracing our new home as a Xerox business. On behalf of Go Inspire – we thank him for his support, dedication and tireless pursuit of excellence as we celebrate his achievements as CEO.’

Mr Headley commented: ‘I am immensely grateful for the career I have been afforded within Go Inspire. I have been fortunate to work with some incredible people over the years, and I’d like to extend my thanks to my talented team and colleagues at Go Inspire and Xerox.’

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