It is based on a patented composite material that is designed to offer improved performance and lower costs than the pressboard usually used for longer runs, while retaining pressboard’s ease of cutting.

Pink matrices are claimed to be suitable for runs in excess of 150,000.

“This is the best of both worlds, it cuts like paper but won’t delaminate,” said C&T managing director Simon Shenton.

Pink uses a resin and synthetic fibre composite called Rosadium that the firm spent several years developing and followed that up with field tests over the past year.

Other new features of the Pink matrix include adhesive tape that is 20 times stronger than standard tapes, locators that improve alignment and reduce shoulder wear, and a sharp chamfer to reduce jams.

Shenton said that the stronger tape was important as firms switched to thin plate dies and to storing them for re-use as clients move to more frequent, shorter runs of the same job.

“Firm’s are moving from one 200,000 run to ten 20,000 runs and storing the die,” said Shenton. “To ensure the matrices stand up to storage the glue needs to be stronger to make sure they stay on the plate.”