Carolyn Cagney, managing director of the offset and digital printer, said the Nexpress platform provided the best value for money, particularly because it can be upgraded rather than replaced.
Five Star will take delivery of the new model in about 12 weeks, and Cagney said “my sole reasoning is financial”.
Cagney pointed to the extra sheet as well as a cheaper click rate, while adding that she expected the Nexpress would raise Five Star’s break-even point from 250 A3 sheets to around 300-400.
“It will push us more into the offset market with the digital side because of the price,” she told ProPrint.
Trent Eagle, Nexpress sales specialist at Konica Minolta, said one of the strong selling points of the Nexpress is its resale value and upgradeability.
He added that printers could buy a rival machine with a similar speed and long sheet capability, or one that offered the quality and gloss, or for the ability to match Pantones “[but] with the Nexpress, you can have all of these capabilities in the one unit and still know that your investment will have a long future on the factory floor”.
The SX platform was a talking point at the exhibition, with another sale to Sydney printer Digitalpress announced on day two, but the exact model was actually absent – the machine on the Konica stand at PrintEx11 was an SE3000, which users can upgrade when the SX platform becomes available in June.
PrintEx11 was the unofficial unveiling of the forthcoming upgrade, which can handle a longer sheet up to 660mm, allowing users to produce 6pp brochures or 3-up A4.
Five Star, which operates a Heidelberg XL 105 offset press as well as an HP Indigo 5500 and a Konica Minolta Bizhub Pro 6500, buys its plates from Kodak and has been a long-term user of Prinergy workflow.
The Nexpress range is sold by Konica Minolta, which has been distributing the presses since announcing a sales partnership with Kodak at PacPrint09.
It is the second new Nexpress for Adelaide in the past six months, after Finsbury Green bought an SE3000 model earlier this year. The green-minded company was swayed by the upgradeability of the Nexpress range, and is also expected to get move to the SX platform.
Pictured: Carolyn Cagney, Konica Minolta national manager, production printing group David Procter and Kodak managing director Adrian Fleming
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