The Italian press manufacturer will install a 16-tower, four-folder flexo press at the publisher's new 80m plant in Didcot, Oxfordshire.

The satellite press will be able to produce two runs of a 128pp full-colour Daily Mail in straight mode, or three runs of a 160pp Mail on Sunday in collect mode.

Harmsworth Quays, the world's largest flexo plant, will be upgraded with a 16m project to add 32 printing units, giving 48 full-colour towers in the plant. Its KBA Flexo-Courier presses will be able to print six full-colour straight runs of 128pp, or eight collect runs at 160pp.

John Bird, HQP managing director, praised KBA for the quality of its presses at the London plant, and described the choice of Cerutti at Didcot as a "tough decision".

He said: "We felt that the satellite technology gives better registration and opportunities for colour."

Christine Klafkowska, who has been production director at HQP for the last eight years, has been named as managing director of the Didcot site. She said: "I'm very excited and we will make sure the project runs smoothly and to schedule."

Print testing will begin in the autumn of 2007, with full production due to start during 2008. The new plant will run CTP, while CTP lines will also be added at HQP. Bird said that US newspaper printers currently run MacDermid Flexo CTP, and that the firm was "very much in our minds".

A quarter-fold feature on the four folders will allow the plant to print semi-commercial products on high-gloss supercalendered stock to fill the daytime slots.

Bird added that a "very few" staff would move from HQP to the 12-acre brownfield Didcot site, but that the majority of staff would be recruited locally.

Story by Josh Brooks