manroland Australasia Customer Club meets in Melbourne

The manroland Australasia Customer Club held its first two-day information session in Melbourne last week to update locals on the latest developments from the offset press giant. Print21 editor, Simon Enticknap, was there to find out what went on.

The first meeting of the manroland Australasia Customer Club followed on from dinners held in Sydney and Melbourne last year. Local Roland users were updated on the latest worldwide developments in sheetfed and web offset printing as well as local initiatives by manroland Australasia.

Managing director, Steve Dunwell, kicked off proceedings by outlining how the company has grown since setting up as a independent supplier just over two years ago. The company now employs 42 staff and is looking to grow further. Over the past year, despite the slowdown in the industry, it has achieved some significant press sales with the likes of Fairfax Media, Franklin Web and VistaPrint.

Peter Kuisle was one of two executives from manroland Germany who attended the forum, outlining new developments in web press technology. These include the roll-out of manroland’s autoprint ‘One Touch’ automation for newspapers which has now been adopted to varying degrees on 29 presses worldwide.

Pictured: Marco Faulhaber (left) and Peter Kuisle (right) travelled from manroland in Germany to attend the first manroland Australasia Customer Club inaugurated by Steve Dunwell, manroland Australasia managing director (centre).

The most impressive example was a video he showed of a site at Barleben in Germany which combines robotic plate loading with automated logistics to transport plates from prepress to the press and load them automatically. The video looked so futuristic that Kuisle had to remind viewers that it was real and not an animation. Using this system, one operator is able to change 196 plates on the press in three minutes.

Safwen Hijazi (pictured below with Steve Dunwell) from plate manufacturer Xingraphics was one of two representatives from partner suppliers to attend the forum. Hijazi outlined the history of Xingraphics and discussed some of the thermal CTP plate products that the company produce. These include the forthcoming Fit eco plate which is billed as the first ‘true processless’ plate for thermal CTP devices.

Over the course of two days, manroland specialist, Tony Kenny outlined a number of new developments in the sheetfed market. These included manroland’s Futureproof concept whereby any sheetfed press is guaranteed to be ‘upgradeable’ for a period of five years, meaning that owners can continue to add new systems and additional automation to a press after its initial installation, thereby safeguarding their investment.

Service is the “heart and soul” of the new manroland, according to Steve Dunwell, so it was appropriate that father and son duo, Graham and Dennis Wickham, were on hand to present the local service initiatives in the web and sheetfed sectors. These include extending the online purchase of non-emergency parts to the sheetfed sector, expanding the 24-hour TeleSupportCenter global support network to include sheetfed presses, and adding training to the range of services offered by manroland in 2011.

Day 1 concluded with a business session at which printers were urged to engage in some ‘blue ocean’ thinking, followed by dinner and an impressive performance by a most energetic African dance troupe.

Day 2 sessions were scheduled to include presentations on sheetfed technology fighting back against digital print, the Printcom range of pressroom consumables, and advice on how to improve pressroom performance from Marco Faulhaber, manroland executive vice-president for printservices.

Adrian Fleming from Kodak was also due to outline the technology surrounding the integration of Kodak inkjet technology into newspaper presses for which manroland is the local agent.