The three Geon auctions grossed $7.7m, with Melbourne raising $3.1m, Sydney $2.4m and Brisbane $2.2m. The auction prices were higher than most dealers were expecting. Geon creditors won’t see any of the money, after commissions it will all go to Geon’s final owner KKR.
One striking feature of the Geon auctions was how little investment the company made in equipment, in the past six years it spent virtually nothing.
The auction at Geon’s Banksmeadow site saw overseas
dealers take all three main presses, with the 12-colour Heidelberg bound for
Taiwan, the ten-colour Speedmaster going to Honk Kong via a French dealer, and
following bidding between a Kiwi dealer and the French the six-colour plus
coater 2006 Heidelberg CD74-6+C is heading across the Tasman.
Geon’s Melbourne ten-colour Heidelberg went for $360,000, the eight-colour for $420,000. Both are bound for China, which is currently in a press buying spree, Komori alone sold some 130 presses at ChinaPrint last week, with rival press manufacturers reporting similar order levels.
There was fierce bidding at the Geon Melbourne auction for the Komori 529, with a local printer winning out, that is the only press from the Geon and Vega print sites that will stay in the country.
The Brisbane auction saw overseas dealers take all three presses; the six-colour half-size Heidelberg CD74-6 with 44 million impressions on the clock raising $575,000. The ten-colour Speedmaster SM 102 long perfector sold for $345,000 while the similar 2003 10-colour Heidelberg SM 102 perfector went for $330,000.
The five presses from Vega were all bought pre-auction from
receiver KPMG by UK dealer DPM, with its managing director Mark Sheldrick
sealing the deal by phone from London before jetting out to inspect his
purchases, and to attend the Geon Melbourne and Sydney auctions. Sheldrick
says, “Three of the Vega presses will go to China, one to Thailand and one to
Malaysia.”
The four machines on offer at Geon Banksmeadow raised
$1,114,000 between them. The ten-colour 2006 SM 102 delivered $470,000 for
the receiver, while the 12-colour 2001 SM 102 was snapped up
for $255,000. The six-colour plus coater 2006 CD74 went for $370,000, while a
two-colour GTO 52Z went for a bargain price of only $19,000.
Geon’s HP Indigo, located at the Queensland site, was sold for $52,500, about five per cent of its new buy price
The removal of 14 B1 presses – six of them long
perfectors – from the local market will reduce capacity by a decent amount,
giving some cheer to hard pressed local printers, and to new and used press salesmen.
The ‘everything must go, no reserve price’ approach by the
auctioneers made for some great deals, with finishing equipment in particular
proving popular with local printers, one Kiwi printer bought an MBO folder for
just $3,000 in Melbourne and spent the night celebrating, quipping that he had
spent more on the night than on the folder.
Two original Heidelberg cylinder presses at Banksmeadow
went cheap, the SBB was bought for $24,000, while the SB was sold for just
$10,000.
Most expensive piece of finishing kit was the Muller
Martini A7 Acoro from Geon Banksmeadow, which went for $385,000 to Southern Colour Victoria.
Saddle stitchers
from Muller Martini and Heidelberg were going for between $40,000-$70,000. Stahl folders were going for anything between $10,000 and
$40,000. Polar guillotines were reaching between $40,000-$50,000.
A 2006 Screen PlateRite CTP went for $35,000 while a
Creo Lotem CTP was snapped up for just $17,000 at the NSW auction.
The auctions attracted large crowds, both on site and online taking part in
the global webcast, of what was billed as Australia’s largest ever print
auction.
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