The firm, which was set up by Garnett Dickinson in 2000 and has grown to sales of 750,000, will use the Karat for jobs like letterheads and direct mail.

Digitec also runs an Indigo UltraStream, and has just moved it from a single shift to 12-hour working. The 46 Karat will fill a gap between the UltraStream and Garnett Dickinsons large-format sheetfed presses.

Operations director Joel Dickinson said Rotherham-based Garnett Dickinson had big ambitions for its digital division.

The 46 Karat would allow it to cost-effectively produce runs of up to 20,000, he said, although it wont be hunting multi-page contracts.

Digitec already counts blue-chips like Thomas Cook and British Airways as customers and it employs a dozen staff. Its in-house finishing capability includes a Duplo stitcher-collator and laminating.

The firm currently outsources offline folding work so it could look to bring that in-house too, added Dickinson.

Story by Gordon Carson