Speaking at an open house event at the firm’s first European beta installation – at German folding carton printer Edelmann – earlier this week, Amir said that a continental flexible packaging specialist would be the first customer for the 1m-wide, 100m/min W10, which would mean Landa will have all three of its current press platforms operating in the field by Drupa.
A number of major UK packaging printers attended the two-day event.
Landa currently has four installations with a further four announced, including the UK’s Bluetree Group which is now set to install its S10P perfecting press in late summer.
“More will be announced soon, to be installed in the next 12 months,” Amir stated. “Behind the scenes there are lots of activities going on to make sure customers can grow and ramp up production.”
He shared an image of the expected installation map in three years' time (below).
Amir said that as part of the ramp up Landa was currently opening System Plant 3 in Israel, with System Plant 4 also on the cards.
“We are expanding our facilities for the production of more and more presses, and a lot needs to happen in terms of service and support. I’m very proud and energised with what is happening,” he added.
Edelmann’s 6,500sph S10 press was installed in February 2018. A month ago the firm upgraded to the seven-colour configuration of the B1 press allowing it to match more than 95% of Pantone colours, and the press is also fitted with the AQM closed-loop colour control system.
The €300m-plus (£265m) turnover print group operates from 21 sites around the world and has three core product areas: healthcare, beauty care, and consumer brands.
Chief executive Oliver Bruns stated: “I can already say it was probably our best decision to partner with Landa. It is not just a supplier-customer relationship, it is far more.
“We are serving some of the most sophisticated brands on the planet and quality is absolutely key. Emotionally I love the colour. But the Landa technology really allows us to get a good ROI and that’s just as essential. Speed and efficiency allows us to earn money with the press.”
The S10 is installed in a press hall alongside 10 Heidelberg Speedmaster litho presses, without any special housing. Edelmann is using it for a combination of production jobs and concept work, with one brand owner booking the press for three days to experiment with the possibilities.
Bruns said that having the press had also attracted new business. “We are now serving a couple of customers we were not dealing with before. Having the Landa press has been a significant door-opener.”
Group technical director Oliver Sattel said the firm had carried out extensive trials over the past year in order to understand the possibilities of the press.
“We have done a tremendous number of trials with different board materials,” he explained. “This included litho pre-print UV and conventional, hot foil, cold foil, lamination, cutting and gluing processes to find out if there were any limitations on the technology.
“We didn’t find anything that scared us, even metallised PET board was not a problem.”
Landa is also working on a digital white ink for the sheetfed presses, and continues to develop the high-speed upgrade to 13,000sph.
