The firm has worked with US and Japanese printing equipment firms. It has yet to make any European installations, though it claims to have strong interest from a number of European firms.
SDP print heads are used in the Jet-Pac, a press for printing onto corrugated board developed by US firm United Container. Jet-Pac is in use at Inland Paperboard & Packaging and is also used to provide on demand printing for packaging e-commerce site www.pack agegenie.com.
Among the applications Inland has used the machine for are test packaging for a drinks firm. It sent samples to the client in two days, whereas rivals took up to two weeks, said Frederiksen.
PackageGenie offers a 72-hour turnaround from submitting a design on its website to delivery of printed packaging. It has a library of 160 box shapes and sizes that can be customised with a firms graphics.
The Jet-Pac consists of a sheet-feeder, pre-coater to provide more durable print, print heads and a stacker. It can run at up to 300m per minute.
At the speed the SDP heads can run at its capable of keeping up with flexo presses for inline use, as a Japanese firm has developed.
The print quality produced is claimed to be equivalent to flexo on corrugated board, but with less vibrant colours.
Frederiksen said that SDPs approach complemented that of sister firm Scitex Vision and its CoreJet (formerly the Aprion Shaldag).
Were coming at packaging from different angles, he said. Aprion is designed for 100% coverage and higher quality. Were higher volume and less coverage.
Story by Barney Cox
