John Crosfield Foundation to be wound up
The Printing Charity will use the funds, totalling more than £17,000, to continue to provide bursary grants to students on courses related to printing technology and print business management. Set up in 2000, The John Crosfield foundation was registered as a charity by former employees of Crosfield Electronics as a means of keeping the Crosfield name and legacy alive in the printing industry. John Crosfield, who passed away in March 2012 aged 96, pioneered automatic register control and colour scanning technologies for the printing industry with his company Crosfield Electronics, which won 15 Queen’s Awards for Technology and Exports. The Printing Charity is backed by £25m of investments and has set of target of helping three times as many people as it currently supports through training and funding in hardship. Printing Charity chief executive Stephen Gilbert said: “Feelings are a little mixed because the foundation is winding up, but the reason we were chosen was because we are doing something with Print Futures. Last year we put £30,000 into the initiative. “We helped 612 people last year and aim to help 2,000 in 2017. We are very well funded and backed by £25m of investments, so we know we can deliver. Our issue is not raising money but helping more people; we know they are out there, we need to find them.” John Crosfield Foundation chair of trustees and former deputy managing director of Crosfield Electronics Lars Janneryd said: “Over the last 13 years, the foundation has helped 16 students through their degrees to go on to successful careers in the printing industry. We feel it is time to pass this charitable purpose to another organisation. “The Printing Charity, which was established in 1827 and last year gave away over £1m, is well able to do this. The Print Futures Awards, co-sponsored by the charity, give grants to young people aged between 16 and 30. This very much aligns with the aims of the John Crosfield Foundation.”...
read moreTime runs out for The Colourhouse
A number of sources told PrintWeek that the locks were changed at the Deptford-based printer’s site on Wednesday, a day before wages were due to be paid, although this was unconfirmed. Speculation has been rife about The Colourhouse in recent weeks, with staff leaving, equipment being put up for sale and suppliers putting the company on stop. Meanwhile, a new company – Colourhouse 2013 – was registered at the same address as The Colourhouse on 1 October 2013. Colourhouse directors Randle White, Lee Reeves and David Arkell were all listed as directors of the new business, together with David Crowe and Michael O’Halloran. When contacted by PrintWeek on 16 October, Arkell initially denied knowledge of Colourhouse 2013 before stating that there were no plans to use the new company. Subsequent attempts to contact The Colourhouse went unanswered. PrintWeek understands that the company’s directors – Randle White, Lee Reeves and David Arkell – had attempted to save the business via a buyout or takeover. However, time appears to have run out this week after Bibby Financial Services filed a notice of intent to appoint administrators at the High Court on 29 October; at the time of writing an administrator had yet to be appointed. A source told PrintWeek: “The directors seem to have worked very hard to find a rescue plan but they have finally run out of options.” The firm installed a new Heidelberg Speedmaster XL106 earlier this year. It was at number 223 in last year’s PrintWeek Top 500 with sales of £10.6m and 83 employees (taken from accounts dated 31/12/2011)....
read moreJohn Crosfield Foundation to be wound up
The Printing Charity will use the funds, totalling more than £17,000, to continue to provide bursary grants to students on courses related to printing technology and print business management. Set up in 2000, The John Crosfield foundation was registered as a charity by former employees of Crosfield Electronics as a means of keeping the Crosfield name and legacy alive in the printing industry. John Crosfield, who passed away in March 2012 aged 96, pioneered automatic register control and colour scanning technologies for the printing industry with his company Crosfield Electronics, which won 15 Queen’s Awards for Technology and Exports. The Printing Charity is backed by £25m of investments and has set of target of helping three times as many people as it currently supports through training and funding in hardship. Printing Charity chief executive Stephen Gilbert said: “Feelings are a little mixed because the foundation is winding up, but the reason we were chosen was because we are doing something with Print Futures. Last year we put £30,000 into the initiative. “We helped 612 people last year and aim to help 2,000 in 2017. We are very well funded and backed by £25m of investments, so we know we can deliver. Our issue is not raising money but helping more people; we know they are out there, we need to find them.” John Crosfield Foundation chair of trustees and former deputy managing director of Crosfield Electronics Lars Janneryd said: “Over the last 13 years, the foundation has helped 16 students through their degrees to go on to successful careers in the printing industry. We feel it is time to pass this charitable purpose to another organisation. “The Printing Charity, which was established in 1827 and last year gave away over £1m, is well able to do this. The Print Futures Awards, co-sponsored by the charity, give grants to young people aged between 16 and 30. This very much aligns with the aims of the John Crosfield Foundation.”...
read moreLanda and Komori seal partnership deal
When Landa launched its Nanography presses at Drupa, the press platforms for the prototype models on show were supplied by Komori. The two companies have now announced the signing of a long-term strategic alliance for production models. Landa said it had spent a year “evaluating proposals from the industry’s leading press vendors” and described Komori as being “in a class of its own”. It stated: “In making its assessment, Landa took into account the calibre of engineering, robustness of design, automation, reliability and cost effectiveness. The vendor’s culture of innovation, technical resources, commercial success and financial stability were also important criteria.” While Landa will use the Komori platform for its own-brand models, Komori will gain Nanography know-how for it own range of digital presses based on the technology. Landa has placed orders for Komori platforms for its Landa S10FC B1-format press for folding cartons, slated to be the first model to ship in Q4 next year. Of the 430 presses Landa has letters of intent for, some 170 are for this model. Landa founder and chairman Benny Landa appeared to contrast Komori’s position to that of financially challenged European press manufacturers in his statement, which said: “It is gratifying to have as our strategic partner the one global press vendor that continues to thrive despite the challenges faced by the industry.” Regarding the licence deals agreed with Heidelberg and Manroland Sheetfed announced at Drupa, Landa said: “Access to Landa Nanographic Printing technology is granted in stages, subject to the licensee meeting certain requirements at each stage. Komori was first to meet those requirements and will be first to market with its own-branded products. Others will follow.” Landa added: “We still expect Nanography to become a universal standard, but we are moving one step at a time, and that step starts with Komori.” Komori has just announced its half-year results and an upgrade to its revenue and profit forecasts for the full year. Sales were up 37.4% to ¥40.9bn (£260m) in the six months to 30 September, while operating profits were ¥3.4bn compared with last year’s ¥1.6bn loss. The firm’s share price has more than tripled in the past year, and is currently at ¥1,542 (low: ¥417). Yoshiharu Komori, Komori chairman, said he was “amazed” at Landa’s progress, and went so far as to compare its potential with that of the advent of digital printing: “Our teams have been closely monitoring Landa’s development and have been amazed with the progress made so far, which exceeds our expectations. “We believe that the impact of Benny Landa’s new invention, Nanography – with the Komori platform – will have a far greater impact even than his introduction of the first digital printing press,” Komori stated. Manroland Sheetfed and Heidelberg were unavailable for comment at the time of writing....
read moreLanda and Komori seal partnership deal
When Landa launched its Nanography presses at Drupa, the press platforms for the prototype models on show were supplied by Komori. The two companies have now announced the signing of a long-term strategic alliance for production models. Landa said it had spent a year “evaluating proposals from the industry’s leading press vendors” and described Komori as being “in a class of its own”. It stated: “In making its assessment, Landa took into account the calibre of engineering, robustness of design, automation, reliability and cost effectiveness. The vendor’s culture of innovation, technical resources, commercial success and financial stability were also important criteria.” While Landa will use the Komori platform for its own-brand models, Komori will gain Nanography know-how for it own range of digital presses based on the technology. Landa has placed orders for Komori platforms for its Landa S10FC B1-format press for folding cartons, slated to be the first model to ship in Q4 next year. Of the 430 presses Landa has letters of intent for, some 170 are for this model. Landa founder and chairman Benny Landa appeared to contrast Komori’s position to that of financially challenged European press manufacturers in his statement, which said: “It is gratifying to have as our strategic partner the one global press vendor that continues to thrive despite the challenges faced by the industry.” Regarding the licence deals agreed with Heidelberg and Manroland Sheetfed announced at Drupa, Landa said: “Access to Landa Nanographic Printing technology is granted in stages, subject to the licensee meeting certain requirements at each stage. Komori was first to meet those requirements and will be first to market with its own-branded products. Others will follow.” Landa added: “We still expect Nanography to become a universal standard, but we are moving one step at a time, and that step starts with Komori.” Komori has just announced its half-year results and an upgrade to its revenue and profit forecasts for the full year. Sales were up 37.4% to ¥40.9bn (£260m) in the six months to 30 September, while operating profits were ¥3.4bn compared with last year’s ¥1.6bn loss. The firm’s share price has more than tripled in the past year, and is currently at ¥1,542 (low: ¥417). Yoshiharu Komori, Komori chairman, said he was “amazed” at Landa’s progress, and went so far as to compare its potential with that of the advent of digital printing: “Our teams have been closely monitoring Landa’s development and have been amazed with the progress made so far, which exceeds our expectations. “We believe that the impact of Benny Landa’s new invention, Nanography – with the Komori platform – will have a far greater impact even than his introduction of the first digital printing press,” Komori stated. Manroland Sheetfed and Heidelberg were unavailable for comment at the time of writing....
read moreHealeys invests in Nexpress S2500
Managing director Philip Dodd said the press offered dimensional print, spot gloss and ultra matt and he aimed to add metalised and neon capability in the near future. The new machine runs alongside a Ricoh 901, which will now be used for backup. “Sadly saying you’re a B2 litho printer does not get people yelping with joy these days,” he said. “Litho will still drive volumes for some time, but if you want added-value services and are looking for wow factor through touchy feely matt or spot gloss this is one way to go about it. “Digital represents almost 10% of our business and we needed to be able to reliably keep up with growth without comprising quality. Being able to print metallic golds and silvers is unique in digital. Added with the ability to spot gloss inline, this press really does offer something different.” Healeys spent £875,000 on a five-colour Heidelberg XL 75 with coater and Inpress control in February and the 31-staff business aims to bump up turnover from £3m to £3.6m next year. The company was not looking for large jobs but runs of around 1,000 offering makeready reductions....
read moreHealeys invests in Nexpress S2500
Managing director Philip Dodd said the press offered dimensional print, spot gloss and ultra matt and he aimed to add metalised and neon capability in the near future. The new machine runs alongside a Ricoh 901, which will now be used for backup. “Sadly saying you’re a B2 litho printer does not get people yelping with joy these days,” he said. “Litho will still drive volumes for some time, but if you want added-value services and are looking for wow factor through touchy feely matt or spot gloss this is one way to go about it. “Digital represents almost 10% of our business and we needed to be able to reliably keep up with growth without comprising quality. Being able to print metallic golds and silvers is unique in digital. Added with the ability to spot gloss inline, this press really does offer something different.” Healeys spent £875,000 on a five-colour Heidelberg XL 75 with coater and Inpress control in February and the 31-staff business aims to bump up turnover from £3m to £3.6m next year. The company was not looking for large jobs but runs of around 1,000 offering makeready reductions....
read moreNew kit at Kestrel Printing helps Kilimanjaro bid
The Konica Minolta C6000 digital press, won in a competition run by paper supplier Antalis UK, was used to print leaflets and fliers in runs of up to 5,000 for cystic fibrosis charity fundraiser Joe Tonge, aged 19. Kestrel Printing, based in Southend-on-Sea, runs the new machine alongside a Konica Minolta C6500 for short-run business cards, leaflets and brochures. The 28-staff business also runs litho kit such as a five-colour Komori L28 and two Heidelberg GTOs and makes around £2m turnover. Director Keith Ross said: “The new machine, which we won on a draw after buying Antalis paper, has a list price of over £100,000 so it’s a great win and will double our digital capacity. More people want smaller quantities but quicker turnaround times so this kit is ideal.” The new machine runs at 34 SRA3 sheets a minute. Kestrel Printing went digital two years ago and intended to use its original Konica Minolta a couple of times a week. Demand soon saw it running up to 12 hours, five days a week. Digital “picked up a lot more than we anticipated”, said Ross. Co-director John Galley added: “This latest edition to our range of printing equipment will help us to boost our own business offering, especially with the onset of our new online ordering facility.” Tonge aims to be the first person with cystic fibrosis to reach the 19,341ft summit in Africa and is climbing on behalf of Southend’s Cystic Fibrosis Association. He visited Kestrel Printing recently with association colleague Chris Hyde and Emily Hewett who designed the...
read morePaperlinx in strategic partnership with DHL
According to a statement, Paperlinx and DHL have “identified a number of common strategic initiatives, capable of driving value for both organisations through close collaboration”. However, Paperlinx chief executive Andrew Price stressed that no final decisions had been made on what form the strategic partnership will take and added that at this stage it was focused on developing a five-year logistics business plan that will aim to reduce costs and, according to the company, “create a more flexible operational model”. “What we’re stating is our intention to work with DHL at a strategic level to identify ways to deliver our products, better, faster, cheaper to our customers,” said Price. “Right now, all we’re doing to is setting up the ground rules to enable both companies to work closely on what that solution will look like. We’re approaching this with a completely open mind.” Price said that Paperlinx had looked at a number of possible logistics partners and had identified DHL as having the right scale and synergies. It’s understood that the partnership will not be focussed purely on customer deliveries, and could extend to inbound deliveries to Paperlinx, possibly including deliveries from Asia. Other areas under the microscope will be stock strategy, network integration and procurement. At this stage the company is yet to reveal if the DHL deal, once it’s finalised will be in the UK only, across Europe or even Global. However, Price admitted that one outcome of the partnership could be DHL taking over customer deliveries. “That could be an outcome if it satisfies my criteria of being better, faster cheaper.” “But the only thing we’re sure of at this stage is that we don’t know what a paper merchant will look like in five years time. All we do know is that the most successful merchants won’t look like they do now,” he said. “We all have to change; we’ve got changing customer needs and a changing market.” While the final shape of the deal is still to be decided, Price said that while it was possible, it was unlikely that the DHL partnership would come to nothing as the two companies had already carried out some initial work that indicated there were areas they could “work together”. Price said he anticipated an outline of the partnership would be finalised by the end of this year, although he said any significant changes to its logistics would be rolled out in stages to ensure service continuity....
read moreDS Smith hails ‘market share gains’ and eyes further acquisitions
Speaking to analysts ahead of next month’s interim results announcement (on 5 December), Roberts said that “every part of the business has performed well and is improving” following last summer’s SCA deal, adding that central and eastern Europe and Italy had registered the strongest growth. Commenting on the firm’s acquisition strategy, Roberts said: “We continue to bed down the SCA acquisition, the cost synergies are all on track, and our customers are rewarding us: we’re not just [incurring] cost we’re seeing the revenues coming through as well now. “And our customers – putting it bluntly – are saying ‘we would like to see you in some other areas DS Smith; in Europe we would like to see you extending further [because] we like what we see’. They are certainly encouraging us to continue to grow and we’re out there looking.” However, Roberts warned that the company would not pay over the odds to achieve its goals. “At the end of the day we’ve got to make money for our shareholders and some people we’ve been talking to want some very high prices, which we’re not going to pay, but I think there are a number of opportunities there and we’ll come back in due course,” he said. Commenting on the group’s progress in the six months to 31 October 2013, Roberts said: “Our packaging business has continued to gain further market share and… Corrugated volume growth remains well in excess of our GDP+1% target.” Roberts said that DS Smith was seeing “continued gains from the larger [FMCG] players”, while its strategy to become the biggest recycled packaging company in Europe was “building resilience into the growth we’re seeing”. “The reason we target the FMCG market is because it’s resilient, so it doesn’t rise and fall with the same volatility as the industrial sector,” he said. “So we’re trying to build resilience into our growth and not just ride on the back of a sort of a housing upturn in the UK, which is nice while it lasts but it’s notoriously volatile.” He added that the larger FMCG businesses were growing “pretty much at the expense of some of the smaller players” and said that there was “more stability” in the market than in recent years, with “growth overall slightly positive”. “We have some really quite exciting prospects in central and eastern Europe and we really have seen that coming through not just in the last quarter but in the outlook [for] the coming 6-12 months,” he said....
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