The S20 can image 52 1.6x3.1m sheets, or 250sqm per hour - less than half the 600sqm per hour of its bigger brother the Onset.

"You don't have to be very bright to see that we needed something between the Onset's 125 beds per hour and the 20 per hour Turbo," said Inca managing director Bill Baxter, who dubbed the machine the Baby Onset.

"There are a lot of people for whom the Onset is too much."

The £700,000 S20 will start beta testing at a UK printer before the end of the year and will begin commercial sales by next April.

Inca says the sweet spot for the machine is for firms with daily print volumes of 1,500-4,000sqm of high-quality POP.

Unlike the CMYK-only Onset, the S20 will be available in four-colour and six-colour versions with either light cyan and light magenta, orange and violet or dual-channel white options in addition to CMYK. It also features a gloss level control to produce finishes from matte, through satin to high gloss depending on application.

Automatic sheet unloading, and what Inca terms three-quarters automation using a pre-loading table, will also be available to ensure the high print speed translates into high productivity.

In another first, the machine was been designed to allow users to replace print heads themselves rather than needing an engineer to visit.

The Onset S20 is the latest launch in the burgeoning high-end UV flatbed sector, which Inca created with the original Onset, and follows HP's launch of the Scitex FB7500 earlier this month and Vutek's DS at Drupa.

Inca Onset S20
Sheet size: 1.6x3.12m
Speed: 250m2/hour
Colours: Four-colour, four-colour plus white or six-colour
Price: £700,000
Availability: April 2009