Norern Ireland s biggest commercial printer steps up production with Fujifilm Superia CTP and plates investment

Northern Ireland's biggest commercial printer steps up production with Fujifilm Superia CTP and plates investment

03.04.2017

Bryan McClay, Production Director at GPS

Fujifilm announces that Belfast-based GPS Colour Graphics has chosen Fujifilm Superia technology to boost its production capacity, reduce costs and further improve its environmental credentials.

Having just moved to a new 125,000 square foot purpose-built facility, GPS has invested in a PlateRite HD 8900Z from Fujifilm. This high productivity B1+ thermal device will run alongside GPS's existing PlateRite 8800Z and give the company the ability to produce in excess of 100 B1 plates per hour, 24 hours a day. GPS has also renewed its existing Superia LH-PJE plate supply contract with Fujifilm for another three years.

Fujifilm had to work hard to win the new contract in the face of stiff competition. Says Bryan McClay, Production Director at GPS: Fujifilm has been a valuable partner to our business for a number of years now, but we surveyed the whole market and looked at all our options. Having done that, we're convinced that this Fujifilm plate is the best on the market, not only in terms of reproduction, but also in handling and on-press manageability.

The combination of GPSs exacting processes and the consistent reliability of the Superia LH-PJE plate enable us to conform to international colour standard ISO 12647 across all our presses - vital given our clients are some of the UK's and Irelands biggest brands. GPS also has a string of environmental credentials and awards, so we're delighted that our new CTP machine measures up to our requirements with significantly reduced power consumption and intelligent processor management.

GPS's range of services includes both conventional lithographic and digital printing, it produces a wide range of printed collaterals, ranging from small runs produced digitally to runs of over half a million lithographically printed on three B1 perfecting presses.

In continued partnership with Fujifilm, McClay is upbeat about GPS's future. We believe that the trend towards fewer, but bigger and more diversified printing companies will continue, he says. Companies prospering in today's so called digital age have realised that putting ink on paper is not enough and they must now satisfy all of their customers' requirements with greater value added services and flexibility. The desire for something more tangible seems to be on the increase and can be witnessed in trends such as millennials reverting back to vinyl as opposed to cloud based music. This bodes well for print; a tactile and tangible medium.

Quality is now a given element and our recent investment in Fujifilm Superia hardware and plates has given us peace of mind for achieving the quality and the reliability we require in our litho department. That's now one less thing for us to worry about and we can focus our time on how we take our business forward to meet current and future trends and challenges in the industry and how we can add value to our clients.

While the pundits were busy writing the obituary for print, our response was and continues to be: believe in the power of print'.

Says Keith Dalton, Managing Director, Fujifilm Graphic Systems UK: After extensive investigation, we are delighted that GPS has proven the overall benefit of the Fujifilm Superia range in terms of total cost of ownership. Often this is forgotten and users end up being far less efficient than expected. We look forward to working in partnership with them for many years to come.

LINK:	https://www.fujifilm.eu/uk/news/article/northern-irelands-biggest-comm...
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