But it’s taken some time for both the technology and the market to catch up with that concept. On-demand printing was first to establish itself as a technology, followed by the finishing: smaller versions of established post-press technologies that could apply a cover and bind the whole book together. And, whether it was cause and effect or not, once the technology was there, the market changed: ever-shortening production runs, together with the collapse of the Net Book Agreement back in 1995, meant that the market for on-demand book printing finally came of age in the early 2000s.

Multi-copy machines
But despite demand, there still aren’t many true book-on-demand integrated production lines capable of producing a single copy profitably. The closest machines so far are various digital presses able to produce a book block that can have a separately printed colour cover incorporated into its online adhesive binding. Muller Martini’s SigmaLine is one such: this is centred around a Delphax electron beam printer and uses Muller’s adhesive binding kit to glue on covers printed separately on a litho press. Other UK book-on-demand printers cobbled together other solutions that are, inevitably, partly offline: Biddles has spent over £4m installing a Nipson digital press for mono text, linked to a Xerox iGen3
for cover printing, with the whole lot standing nearline to a Short Run Solutions case and limp binding line. But even these machines, which are the closest we currently have to a cover plus text integrated line, are generally not aimed at producing single copies: they do ultra-short runs, yes, but not single copies.

All of which makes a new machine, the On Demand Books (ODB) Espresso, rather special. It’s a very simple idea: one mono laser printer, one colour laser printer, and some home-grown binding kit, all hooked up together in a very cost-effective package to produce single book copies in one production run. “Simple, sweet, and deadly effective,” is how ODB chief technical officer Thor Sigvaldason describes it. According to ODB co-founder Jason Epstein: “The Espresso makes ordering and printing a book as easy and fast for the consumer as a cash withdrawal from an ATM or a download of a song to an iPod.”

The Espresso is the brainchild of Jeff Marsh, who invented the alpha version of the machine in the late 1990s. At the same time, Epstein, previously the director of publishing at Random House and founder of the New York Review of Books, began a lecture tour describing his vision of book production in the future. An acquaintance of Marsh’s in the audience came up to him one day after the lecture: “You know that book production press you just described? Well, it exists,” he said, and introduced Epstein to Marsh. Licensing the technology from Marsh, Epstein set up On Demand Books with business partner Dane Neller and began work on the beta version of what’s now the Espresso.

The Espresso’s production line begins with a front-end that accepts PDFs and PostScript data: it’s integrated over a local area network to a front-end production station that runs ODB’s as-yet unnamed repository software. The repository is central to ODB’s concept for the Espresso: every document the Espresso prints comes out of the repository, and is subject to IPR and copyright restrictions as appropriate. (“We’re trying to resist walk-up printing – we don’t want to turn the Espresso into a vanity press,” Sigvaldason says.) The repository software also applies a metadata format to the job, which is basically the association of cover with text and the ability to tally the two through the Espresso’s production line, coupled with trim data and its number of pages.

After the data has been prepared, it’s fed to the printers. The file containing the text data is sent out to the next available laser (the Espresso can incorporate up to six mono laser printer units), while the cover file is sent to the single colour laser printer. At present, the mono lasers are Kyocera FS-9520DN duplex machines, while the colour laser is a KonicaMinolta Magicolor 7200 simplex: the two units have been chosen for their reliability, their capital cost and, importantly, their cost-in-use.

After the cover has been printed, it is transported onto the binding table: the book block, meanwhile, is accumulating in a jogger that keeps it square. The finished block drops into a horizontal transport carriage and is clamped and taken to a vibrating platform that squares it up. The block is then ridden over “what’s basically a spinning drill-bit” that roughens the spine, and then over a glue roller that applies a hotmelt EVA adhesive. The glued block is then taken over to the binding table and onto the cover. The sides of the binding table rise up and clamp the spine and sides of the book, dwelling for six seconds. The book is then transported into the shear, where it’s rotated three times before a large hydraulically-driven shear cuts the bottom, top and fore edges. A shoe then takes the book from the clamp and delivers it into a basket.

Extra modules
One important aspect missing from the Espresso is any ability to laminate covers. Sigvaldason reports that ODB is currently developing an optional module for the Espresso which replaces the colour laser with an inkjet: “A, because it looks nicer than laser for certain types of artwork, and b, because we’ve sourced a good paper stock for inkjet with great water repellence and glossier properties – it looks more like a laminated cover,” he says. Perhaps future versions of the Espresso might have a small thermal laminator as part of the cover print? “Maybe,” Sigvaldason says, “but it would really push the cost up.”

The Espresso is so-called because an important strand of its marketing is in what Sigvaldason calls “café-style book production” – the idea that anyone can walk into a bookstore, order a book and receive it just seven minutes later. “We’re very serious that this is a machine to add revenue and value for bookstores and libraries of all sizes across the world,” he says. To boost the prospect of volume sales of the Espresso, it’s priced to appeal – where something like a DocuTech would be too expensive – a shade under $100,000 (£52,700), which makes for a hugely attractive proposition for the major bookstore branches, libraries, schools or even coffee bars that represent On Demand Books’ initial customer targets.

The first Espresso went into the World Bank’s publishing arm, InfoShop, in April this year; the second was being installed as PrintWeek went to press, in the Library of Alexandria in Egypt. These two are beta machines, and On Demand Books has been quietly refining its design and architecture in the light of the betas’ feedback. The result will be a smaller, quieter, more modular and easier to ship Espresso, the first of which is destined for the New York Public Library at the back end of this year. Sigvaldason anticipates that when the NYPL machine is up and running, On Demand Books will experience a massive surge in demand for the Espresso: “There are thousands of outlets across the world that could use this machine, and they’re all intrigued by it. But it’s new technology, and they’re all waiting to see if it works properly or not. Once they see it does, we could see true on-demand book publishing really taking off.”

---

SPECIFICATIONS
Max finished book size
• 279x431mm
Max stock thickness
• 250gsm (text)
• 240gsm (cover)
Max speed
• nine books per hour dependent on book pagination
Price
• £52,700 ($100,000)
Contact
• On Demand Books 00 1 212 966 3960 www.ondemandbooks.com

---

THE ALTERNATIVES
Xerox Docutech 6180 Book Factory
Xerox’s Book Factory is a workhorse for mono, stitched books – not perfect-bound paperbacks. It’s a duplex machine, but there’s no colour facility – although pre-printed colour covers can be merged in one of the six production trays. The heart of the line is a Nuvera mono printer, and the DocuSP Controller directs work through the line.
Max finished book size 279x431mm
Max stock thickness, text and cover 60gsm-300gsm
Max speed 180 pages per minute
Price not available
Contact Xerox 0870 873 3873 www.xerox.co.uk

Muller Martini SigmaLine
Again, a line for efficient production of mono text blocks, but no integrated capability for producing colour covers – covers can be integrated into the book via a separate tray. Finishing, which is integrated, can be a choice of either stitching or perfect binding. Comprises a Delphax electron beam printer, a SigmaBinder perfect binder and Esprit three-knife trimmer.
Max finished book size 210x297mm
Max stock thickness, text and cover 60gsm-500gsm
Max speed 1,000 books per hour
Price not available
Contact Muller Martini UK 0845 345 3588 www.mullermartini.co.uk