What is EFI’s first hybrid printer? What improvements have been obtained in workflow software and digital front ends? What should be done for efficiency and profitability in digital printing? These and more questions were answered in EFI Connect 2019.
EFI Connect 2019, the 20th edition of Connect, the annual Electronics For Imaging, Inc. (EFI) users conference, where digital printing innovations and trends are launched, was the most intense and successful event to date. The event brought together more than 4,000 worldwide professionals and technical experts in Las Vegas from 22 to 25 January. Textilegence followed this event, which made the participants experience the ‘EFI vision’, in place. EFI welcomed esteemed customers and partners from all over the world and their Turkish Distributor Lydia Grup’s executives Bekir Öz and Adem Öz also attended the conference.
The conference lasted for 4 days, and included over 200 presentations on digital printing, industrial printing, packaging, advertising and textile printing and printing software, application areas and trends. In addition to the presentations, the display are attracted great interest from the visitors where the solutions for these segments were exhibited. VR demonstrations created another point of interest. With the solutions introduced, it was emphasized that EFI has a unique product ecosystem, and the users will gain a competitive advantage by increasing their operational efficiency and will accelerate their growth by taking advantage of market opportunities.
EFI’s first hybrid model VUTEk h5
One of the focal points of the event visitors was the 6th generation hybrid platform VUTEk h5. This 3.5m wide printer has the title of EFI’s first LED hybrid printer with 7-picoliter droplet size and 1,200 dpi resolution. VUTEk h5 was selected as the product of the year in the ‘UV Hybrid/Flatbed – High Capacity Production’ category by an evaluation made by SGIA. This hybrid solution, capable of printing up to 109 boards per hour, features UltraDrop ™ technology with true multi-drop addressability, delivering exceptional smoothness in shadows, gradients and transitions. The drop-in ink design system eliminates ink waste and provides fill-while-printing functionality for continuous productivity.
Nozomi C18000 Single Pass Model for the Graphics and Packaging industries
EFI’s single pass LED digital printing technology Nozomi C18000 was another outstanding product. This LED printer can print 1.8m wide media up to 75 meters per hour. Featuring 75% display graphics and 25% packaging in the packaging industry market share, the product uses a unique white ink that results in vibrant, glossy printing. This white ink is also known as the only product that can print on black substrate.
Bill Muir, the new CEO of EFI, pointed out the technical superiority of the Nozomi C18000 in his presentation. While they do not recommend it and they did not develop the C18000, Muir shared that a user transformed this machine into roll to roll format and reached up to a very serial production potential. It has been noted that EFI is capable of producing about 10 Nozomi C18000 in a quarter, and that they have received repeat orders for the C18000.
2018 has seen innovations in digital textile printing
In recent years, EFI has entered the digital textile printing industry by acquiring Italy-based Reggiani and is continuing their innovations in this field. Since the launch, 25 EFI Reggiani Colors have been sold in the global market. Italian fashion giant Dolce & Gabbana is recorded to use 12 Colors. Following the launch of Colors in the second quarter of 2018, Terra, a pigment solution eliminating the processes such as steaming, washing and finishing was launched in the third quarter, and Bolt, the single pass machine in the fourth quarter. EFI Reggiani Vice President Adele Genoni, speaking at the event; “In 2018, we gained over 60 new customers. In the same year, we also realized the sale of the thousandth digital printer”. Samples printed on many different types of fabric with EFI Reggiani machines gave new inspiration to applications with striking colour and print quality at the event.
The new EFI Fiery FS350 Pro raises the bar in productivity
EFI Connect 2019 also introduces many innovations in Fiery; the well-known digital print server of EFI, used by many major digital printing technology manufacturers. A new, highly developed FS350 platform for the EFI Fiery® digital front end (DFEs); was the first innovation of the year. In addition to the EFI’s ultra-high-speed single-pass inkjet printers; the Fiery FS350 Pro will operate the EFI partners’ new sheet and continuous feed digital production machines. The unique tools that save money on special toners and inks provide amazing colour results in high-value printing products; while reducing waste. John Henze, VP of Marketing and Sales at EFI Fiery; “This new version provides unrivalled productivity from pre-printing to final print on a wide range of digital printers, and provides better colour results for high-value printing products”.
The EFI Fiery proServer Premium DFE, the latest version launched at Connect, for super-wide format inkjet production on EFI printers, uses GPU-accelerated FAST DRIVE technology. This way, it processes individual jobs twice as much as the average at a time, so that users can maximize their printer investment by eliminating the idle time of the printer.
New Productivity Suites by EFI at EFI Connect 2019
The event featured an enhanced version of EFI’s Productivity Suites; a leading end-to-end business and production flow software solution for the printing and packaging industries. These solutions also include the new features of MidMarket Print Suite version 7. Designed to increase productivity, reduce waste; and effectively manage commercial printing and signage and graphics; this product features new features for cross-job grouping and roll substrate management. Midmarket Print Suite now offers better data collection and digital print job visibility in workflow for; dynamic timing, planning and implementation, and easier and more accurate scheduling in cloud configurations.
The EFI Packaging Suite version 7 includes web-to-print re-ordering and advanced tools for flexible packaging management; including the blown film roll weight capture in the suite’s workshop data collection component. The new version of the EFI Corrugated Packaging Suite includes; a product manufacturer interface for calculating multi-part sets, a scanner interface for production scheduling; and digital print and pre-print forecasting, scheduling and data collection tools. Also, version 7 of EPI Publication Print Suite simplifies the process of including contract pricing in businesses. In addition, Publication Print Suite users can now use EFI’s comprehensive shipping component technology.
EFI also announced the newest version of EFI MarketDirect’s integrated customer participation; and revenue boosting platform, offering new social media, 3D visualization and inventory management features. Market Direct software, introduced in Connect, now includes the additional MarketDirect StoreFront® web-to-print software.
EFI Connect 2019 also announced that the company’s Fiery® digital print server technology; and the Landa S10 Nanographic Printing® printer received the new FograCert Validation Printing System certificate from Fogra.