The company, which is the distributor for Hangzhou Cron Machinery & Electronics in the UK, said it had sold 48 thermal and two UV platesetters from its stand at the show (11/D230) by Sunday.

HighWater managing director Jane Wei said: "We supply the full range of Cron thermal and UV CtP and the sales at Ipex have shown that we are a credible, cost-effective, alternative supplier to the traditional pre-press equipment manufacturers."

The company, which supplies two-, fourand eight-page conventional, thermal and UV platesetters said that its success at Ipex stemmed from the fact it already has a European customer base, with more than 20 units sold into 13 countries last year.

"No other Chinese manufacturer can boast this level of CTP installation across Europe. We are providing our customers with a cost-effective and world-class service," said Wei.

"We've brought the price down to meet the needs of small and medium-sized commercial printers and we are very ambitious in this SME market - we want to grow our market share."

HighWater sales director Peter Flynn added that the company had sold two platesetters to government-run security print operations in Eastern Europe, which he said was evidence of the quality of the machines.