Mark Brindley, managing director of Agfa Oceania, says that the company is building on its heritage of precision innovative solutions with its drupa launches.
The company has a new high speed plate processor that can handle 15,000sqm of plates in a single bath life, three times the usual capacity. Brindley says, “And there is no water with the Arkana, we use a gum to wash out and prepare for press. The Energy Elite plates can print up to 600,000 sheets, which is what web offset printers in Australia need.”
The show has also seen the launch of the company’s first LED Anapurna wide format printer, which says Brindley, offers lower running costs due to its significantly lower power consumption.
Agfa’s market share in wide format is now up to almost 20 per cent, with Brindley putting the achievement down to a combination of the technology and Agfa’s service. He says, “Agfa has more people on the ground. There is a lot of knowledge leaving this industry, but Agfa is committed to being there for its customers, and we are showing that day in and day out.”
At the high end, Agfa has positioned its Jeti Tauro, which is available in both three quarter automation and manual modes. Brindley says, “The automated mode adds not much more than 20 per cent to the price, so is well worth it, although printers can upgrade at a later stage if they want to.”
The LED printers –the Anapurna H2500i, the Anapurna H2050i and Anapurna RTR3200i – come with air-cooled LED UV-curing as standard. Agfa says this enables energy saving and reduced running costs. The names of the printers denote their respective widths: the 2500i, 2.5m; the 2050i, 2.05m; and the 3200i, 3.2m with roll-to-roll. They all use six Konica Minolta print heads and print at up to 127sqm per hour in six colours: cyan, magenta, yellow, black, light magenta and white.
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