Landa Announces Beta Sites and Major Orders

Landa opened Drupa 2016 with a flurry of announcements that demonstrate the transition of the company and its Nanography technology from a proof-of-concept, unveiled at Drupa 2012, to a robust line of Nanographic Printing presses that address all major print segments. The company has entered into strategic partnerships with Quad/Graphics, the largest publication printer in the US, and with Cimpress, the global leader in mass customization and web-to-print. In addition, Landa announced that it will deploy its presses at beta sites in Europe and the USA during 2017, naming its key beta site customers. Landa also announced an ultra-fast perfecting web press designed for publishing and direct mail, which will start shipping in late 2017.

“For more than 20 years, digital printing has excelled as a solution for niche markets. Today’s announcements are one big step for Landa – and a giant step for the digital printing industry. With the size and caliber of these customers who will be deploying our Nanographic Printing presses, and the volumes of digital print that they will produce across the globe, we can truly say that digital printing is becoming mainstream.”

Quad/Graphics will strategically collaborate with Landa on bringing Landa Nanographic Printing Presses to the magazine-quality publication market, focusing on cost-effective digital printing for short-run magazines and journals. Quad/Graphics’ Nanographic Printing presses will combine commercial lithographic speeds and quality – even on the lightest-weight coated and uncoated papers. Accordingly, Quad/Graphics will be able to offer short-run magazine and journal printing clients more versatile products.

“Landa Nanography has the potential to disrupt the publication market, marrying the power of modern digital technology with today’s market needs for highly versioned short-run publications,” said Joel Quadracci, Chairman, President & CEO of Quad/Graphics. “We are proud to be partnering with Landa to advance cost-competitive digital print technology for the publication market.”

Cimpress intends to purchase up to 20 presses upon completion of successful testing, in a pact that could become the commercial printing industry’s largest ever digital printing deal.

“Cimpress looks forward to deploying Landa Nanography because we see it as a breakthrough technology that could enable us to transform our mainstream printing that we currently produce with offset presses. It is uniquely suited to a global technology and manufacturing-driven company like our own,” says Robert Keane, president and chief executive officer, Cimpress. “We aggregate, via the Internet, large volumes of individually customized orders for a broad spectrum of print, signage, and other products. Nanography combines quality, speed, substrate-independence and print cost to create a major competitive advantage.”

colordruck Baiersbronn, Germany’s leading folding carton specialist will be Landa’s first customer in Europe for the Landa S10 Nanographic Printing Press. The leading German folding carton specialist will be a beta site and use Landa Nanography as a driver of future business growth.  The Landa S10 press will be central to the Company’s new purpose-built, highly-automated 3,000 square meter digital packaging facility. It will fulfill a variety of customer packaging requirements, from mass customization packaging, individual and small orders, to mock-ups and test market campaigns.

“We chose the Landa press because we believe that Landa Nanography will be the future of print and the future growth driver for colordruck Baiersbronn,” says Frank Buesching, Managing Director. “As economic pressures make themselves felt, brands of all sizes are actively looking to reduce costs, and ideally, print only what they need, when they need it. They also want the production flexibility to better react to market trends with packaging that reflects not only planned and seasonal campaigns, but also special messaging or promotions. To meet these requests, we decided to invest in a Landa S10.”

Elanders, the Swedish headquartered global print and packaging supplier, will be the first beta customer for the Landa S10P Nanographic Printing Press with perfector. The press will be installed at Elanders’ facility in Waiblingen, Germany for the production of short- to medium-run two-sided general commercial printing, including advertising pieces, catalog production, direct mail and high-end magazines. 

“Our new Landa S10P will be instrumental in meeting customer requirements for increased production flexibility. Our customers will now be able to order exactly what they want at a cost they can afford – this is the service breakthrough the market has been waiting for,” said Peter Sommer, Executive Vice President, CEO Elanders Europe.

Imagine!, North America’s leading provider of large-scale point-of-sale displays and instore signage, will be a beta site for the Landa S10 Nanographic Printing Press, Landa’s single-sided B1 (41 in. / 1,050 mm) press. The press will be installed at Imagine!’s facility in Minneapolis, MN and will be predominantly used for POP/POS display work qnd will eliminate setup waste and be used to create versioned stacks of printed product that will dramatically reduce the high costs associated with fulfillment services.

“We bought this press because of Benny Landa’s track record for developing innovative, industry-changing technology,” says Craig Mandery, Chief Business Officer at Imagine!. “We do not usually chase technology trends, however we believe in Nanography and want to be instrumental in the digital-for-mainstream revolution. The reduced setup costs and improved turnaround times will bring substantial growth to our business.”

Landa W10P Nanographic Printing Press is a new meter-wide (41 in.) perfecting press with two printing engines. Designed for the publishing, catalog and direct mail segments, it prints at 200 meters per minute (656 ft./min) on a variety of coated and uncoated papers, light boards and metallic substrates. 

“Fourteen years of nanotechnology research has enabled us to make tremendous breakthroughs in the quality, speed and cost of digital printing. The Landa W10P Nanographic Printing® Press is up to 24 times faster than any other commercial quality digital press and can print more than two million magazine pages in a single 8-hour shift,” says Benny Landa, Chairman of the Landa Group.

Throughout Drupa 2016, Landa will conduct live demonstrations of its sheetfed and webfed Nanographic Printing Presses, including the Landa S10 for folding carton and POP, the Landa S10P perfecting press for commercial printing and the Landa W10 for flexible packaging. Landa will also be demonstrating its newest technology, Nano-Metallography, a zero-waste metallization process that will halve the cost of metallized printing. Landa will hold theater presentations five times a day for the entire duration of the exhibition. Reservations may be booked at kiosks on the Landa stand (Hall 9) during the exhibition.