The Inca Onset large format inkjet printer launched commercially last year and has proven to be so popular that the company is delivering one machine every month. This more than doubles the company’s expectations. The Inca Onset is very fast and has outstanding quality – it is in fact the world’s fastest and fully-automated digital UV flatbed printer.

It has had a major impact on the industry since its debut. Response from the industry to this record breaking printer has been very high. As a result, the Inca’s machine production has been increased to meet demand. Nine of the flagship systems have been installed: four in the United Kingdom, three in North America, and one in Holland and Spain. The Onset can print up to 600 sqm/hr. (125 full bed sheets), with newly launched bi-directional speeds, at a high quality that has led to comparisons with screen printing productivity.

The Onset only requires one operator and can print on substrates up to 15mm thick in manual mode and 10mm in automatic. It delivers an impressive versatility in terms of what can be printed with edge to edge imaging and a choice of gloss or satin finishes. The Inca Onset is the next generation of digital printing in terms of high growth, large format display market and in the wider commercial print market.

Kodak’s sales were up in its second quarter, however, the company acknowledges that it has more work to do to bolster its bottom line as earnings were down during the same period. The company reported its second-quarter numbers and overall the company made $2.485 billion, a one percent increase from its $2.468 billion profits in the second quarter of 2007. Its digital businesses brought in $1.636 billion, a 10% increase from the $1.487 billion tallied in the second quarter of 2007.

Film, Photofinishing, and Entertainment Group revenue totaled $847 million, a 14% decline from $980 million in the second quarter of 2007. Kodak’s digital franchise that they have built has performed well during the quarter. Customer acceptance of their digital plates, digital cameras, digital picture frames, retail printing systems and consumer and commercial inkjet products is strong.

Kodak will put more backing into more of its product lines, like consumer inkjet printers and bumping up the delivery date of its new Stream inkjet technology for commercial printers. The earning losses in the digital group were caused by more money put into the consumer inkjet and image sensor businesses. Higher costs and increased investment in the digital printing business led to lower earnings in the graphic communications field.

Screen USA announced the promotion of Bill Brunone to Vice President of Targeted Inkjet Systems, a newly created position within the company. Brunone will develop and implement a sales strategy for specific inkjet product lines across all Screen USA’s sales regions.

Brunone will perform a significant role by aligning and driving a corporate inkjet sales strategy, starting with the roll-fed TruePress Jet520 color inkjet press and Screen’s new TruePress Jet 650UV, an ultraviolet-cured inkjet flatbed press designed for the printing of industrial parts. He draws on a vast experience in the graphic arts industry and competitive knowledge of front end systems and digital printing technologies in wide-format, transactional, one-to-one marketing and short-run devices.

Before joining Screen in 2006, Brunone worked at Imaje Ink Jet Printing Corp. as Vice President of Systems and Applications where he managed sales, service and application engineering of the company’s high-speed addressing printers. Prior to that, he spent six years at Xerox Corp., holding several management positions, including National Account Business Manager and Global Account Manager. Early on in his career, Brunone created strategic plans and led product development for startups of new business entities in the industrial printing field.

The first European customer for the Oce JetStream full color inkjet system is Cromwell, a Slovakia-based company. They ordered two Oce JetStream 1500 systems that will replace two of the three offset presses they use for producing preprinted mailing shells. The first system is already installed with the second to follow in November.

Cromwell was founded in 1991 and now employs over 60 people. It specializes in transaction printing for a client base of large corporations and medium-sized enterprises. Among their clients are two Slovakian mobile telecommunication providers that use customer invoices. Cromwell also works for many banks and financial service providers, producing well over 10 million A4 pages per month. The two Oce JetStream systems will enable them to accelerate and increase the flexibility of their entire workflow.

Cromwell is looking to complement their traditional transaction printing services by expanding the TransPromo business. This is done by diverting part of their offset fleet and place greater emphasis in future on digital full-color printing. The company expects a complete move to digital printing to deliver efficiency gains right along the print process chain, with more flexibility, time savings in prepress, and the opportunity to individualize the full-color elements of documents.

Inkjet continues to prove a formidable contender to screen and flexo in the well-developed arenas of wide-format and narrow-web label printing. Inkjet is also making inroads into general production printing and offset. In wide-format, EFI Vutek competes against screen with the DS series.

Inkjet has pushed into the narrow-web label sector and opened the door to added-value short-run labels previously out of the budget of anyone but the most high-end packaging buyers. Narrow-web presses, like the Nilpeter’s Caslon, offer a host of inline extras, such as single-pass foiling, embossing or laminating. EFI’s Jetrion 4000 machine, also equipped with Xaar’s 1001 printheads, is another full-color competitor to flexo- or toner-printed labels.

Inkjet also successfully complements other processes. For example, label press manufacturers demonstrate how their machines could run inline after flexo kit offers variably printed label runs. Variable data is a key driver, but there is a buzz about industrial inkjet with the HP Inkjet Web Press that churns through 122m per minute, working out 2,600 A4 pages per minute.