The system, launched by Esko at Drupa, includes a Kongsberg Robotic Cell fitted to a Kongsberg C60 cutting table and also comes with an Esko Device Manager workflow solution.

It will arrive at Data Image’s Leicester premises today (5 December) and will be up and running by the end of the week.

Data Image managing director Robert Farfort said that as a longstanding Esko customer he was aware of the machine before its Drupa release but he officially signed for it in Düsseldorf.

It joins two other Kongsberg XP cutting tables in Data Image's finishing department, which also has 11 Zünd cutters.

Farfort was impressed by the cutting table’s automation and its ability to “facilitate a wider spectrum of substrates than we currently deal with". It will enable Data Image to handle multiple substrates, at a maximum size of 3.2x1.6m, and its heavy-duty tool unit has maximum down force of 50kg. It cuts at 100mpm.

“We have the largest installation of cutting tables under one roof in the UK and going back we have always been really heavy adopters of technology, and this is an area where this kind of technology has been very static for a long period of time,” said Farfort.

Esko’s Device Manager, which is also being implemented this week at the 50-staff outfit’s premises, can monitor job status in real time as well as managing and prioritising queues for all connected devices.

Farfort added: “One thing we’ve worked closely with Esko on is connectivity, using a lot of its products and getting feedback from the devices back to the front-end of the business. Device Manager is going to give us a real front-end visual dashboard, a transparency of productivity." 

In its 3,300sqm collection of six units, Data Image houses 17 digital print output devices, including Dursts, Fujifilm Acuities and Inca Onsets.