Page 52 - Print 21 magazine Jul-Aug 2021

Packaging
Digital corrugated
packaging with EFI Nozomi
One of the first digital carton packaging printers available is the EFI Nozomi, with one already installed in Australia. Print21 editor Wayne Robinson asks Rodd Harrison, VP of sales, Asia Pacific at Electronics For Imaging what the system offers.
Print21: What kind of companies are installing the EFI Nozomi?
Rodd Harrison: The EFI Nozomi C18000 is the
leading single-pass digital printer
in the industry, so it has been installed at many different types
of packaging companies, including larger companies such as Nippon Paper, which has a printer at its Opal plant in Australia. Most installations worldwide are at independent corrugated packaging companies and box plants, with a few installed at dedicated display graphics houses.
P21: What are they using it for? RH: The Nozomis are excelling at just about anything a traditional corrugated packaging company would create using flexo or higher- end litho lamination. Much of the work is secondary packaging that really needs to stand out on the shelf for products at big-box stores and warehouse clubs. The packaging companies with Nozomis also use them for high-graphic content-free- standing display units, and that is a market where digital printing with the Nozomi really excels.
P21: Are they growing a market with Nozomi, or addressing an existing market?
RH: A good amount of Nozomi work addresses existing markets, where users are helping brands address trends with a digital solution that improves the packaging supply chain and reduces warehousing and waste for brands, compared with analogue litho-lamination for high-graphic packaging. Our customers that do both analogue and digital find the rate of work that converts from analogue to digital is higher than they expected.
But there is still another growing market with new opportunities that
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really would not exist without digital. Nozomi users are expanding in their own e-commerce, for example with online ordering for shorter-run packaging. And still others have found a foothold in subscription box packaging, leveraging the Nozomi printer’s ability to deliver the higher- end colour, including excellent solids, and strong double-sided printing capabilities needed in those types of applications.
And then there are completely new applications. One of our customers in the States, a packaging converter named Visual Impact Preprint
(VIP), became the supplier for a start-up company called Suitables, printing children’s corrugated board costumes. Parents can order the costumes online, VIP prints and cuts them, and they are shipped out flat with assembly instructions.
P21: Many digital carton presses are being launched, why would someone choose Nozomi?
RH: Customers choose the Nozomi C18000 for its productivity and
its versatility. Its speed – printing
at 75 linear metres per minute producing up to 10,000 890mm x 890 mm boards per hour – is a strong incentive. But even more than that, the quality and versatility of what customers can produce makes it stand out from other single-pass printers. One third of all Nozomi
users have our white ink installed on the printer. It opens the door to more creative applications printing with white, but it also ensures a higher- end really vivid colour when used under the colour inks directly on the brown board surface.
Nozomi provides exceptional image quality, which is the result of controlling all the key elements of inkjet printing: the printer, the inks, and the software. The printer is the first single-pass digital corrugated printer to pass Fogra’s Process Standard Digital Print Check,
which means it gives packaging converters and corrugated display manufacturers proven verification of the quality and reliability of their digital production offering.
P21: Does EFI have plans to expand its packaging printing portfolio? RH: In fact, EFI is in the midst of launching a new, upgraded model of the Nozomi, the EFI Nozomi C18000 Plus. It incorporates many advanced functionalities in essential aspects of the hardware, software and services that help our clients move to digital. This new version of the Nozomi, which is now available, provides
even further improvements in image quality, media transport, printer uptime, and software performance. There is also a new, onboard quality assurance features, and we have new professional services packages. 21
Above
Digital corrugated printing: EFI Nozomi