The The Aster-Jet range is available in 1.65m-2.2m print widths, while the X-Jet uses the higher resolution Xaar 1001 printhead and can be up to 3.2m wide. This wide-swathe 54mm binary printhead from Xaar is designed for high-volume indoor and outdoor graphics and is available in 35 and 60 picolitre versions.

Companies demonstrating the Xaar 1001 include the single-pass Stork Prints DSI UV five-colour inkjet, single-pass digital label printer; the Neolt X-JET printing quality display graphics on both roll and rigid media; and the Grapo Gemini and Shark printers. These Grapo UV printers from the Cezch republic (with 10 and 8 Xaar 1001 printheads respectively) are designed for high resolution printing at industrial speeds to deliver single-pass printing with greyscale quality

Xaar's new factory in Huntingdon has increased the scope for industrial ink-jet.

As Mark Alexender, director marketing for Xaar said: "The company is investing £22.2m in significant expansion of inkjet head capacity to respond to the demand created."

This expansion will involve: construction of a third full clean-room at the Huntingdon site; over 100 processing asset additions; the recruitment of close to 200 people; and a significant installation and process qualification effort. The plan is well underway and additional capacity is due to start to come on stream in the second half of 2011 with the full capacity available by the second half of 2012.

Seiko had a stall at the show. The company has a strong presence in the Indian market with wide-format machines like Apsom's Colorjet, Monotech's Pixeljet, Caldron's Colorjet and Macart's Picojet.

Others stalls showcasing heads were: Konica Minolta, Ricoh, Epson.

Inkjet specialist Durst which showcased a new version of its Rho series, the 1000L. Capable of speeds of up to 380sqm/hr, the press can be upgraded to enable printing of white ink, as well as additional process colours such as orange and violet. It is a 24/7 pressm and one of the reasons for its break-through in increased speed of 30% is: the development of its Quadra Array printhead technology. This has 1024 nozzles per array, providing 65,000 nozzles in total. The drop straightness with a deviation of 1.5 micron provides high image quality.

It is the same story with EFI, which is set to convert users of solvent-based technology to UV-curable printing. The EFI VUTEk GS3250r is a 3.2m wide-format production printer offering 1,000dpi resolution, dual roll-to-roll capabilities and six-colour GS4 3M Premium UV-curable inks. Where it scores is due to a choice of true 1000 dpi resolution (14 picolitre drop size) or 600 dpi (28 picolitre) to cater for different output requirements. It uses Seiko printheads.