School album printer, Daicolo joins the growing list of satisfied :Azura users and is the largest consumer of Agfa's chemistry-free plate in Japan
Two leading Japanese commercial printers, Daicolo and at Nishikawa Group, have joined a growing list of satisfied chemistry-free Agfa :Azura digital plate users. Daicolo is a leading printer of school albums in Japan and has completed the installation of four :Avalon LF thermal computer-to-plate (CtP) systems with :ApogeeX 3.5 prepress automation software at its plant near Osaka, for use with the :Azura digital offset plate without chemical processing.
The company ordered five of these state-of-the art CtP plate lines from Agfa at Ipex in Birmingham (UK) last year. The fifth unit will be installed early 2007. Daicolo joins the growing list of satisfied :Azura users and is the largest consumer of Agfa’s chemistry-free plate in Japan.
Less than 15 months after its introduction on the Japanese market, more than 40 Japanese medium and high-volume printing companies have successfully implemented a chemistry-free platemaking workflow using :Azura.
"Agfa’s :Azura technology has completely eliminated chemical plate processing from our prepress activities, reducing waste and cost. The image stability and the ease-of-use of the :Azura plate are simply impressive," says Takeshi Kagota, president of Daicolo.
Nishikawa Group, one of the largest web offset printers in Tokyo, has placed an order for four :Avalon LF platesetters with :ApogeeX 3.5 software for its new state-of the-art printing plant expected to begin operations in October 2007. Nishikawa will also use Agfa’s chemistry-free :Azura plate as well as the low-chemistry thermal :Amigo plate for higher print runs.
"Agfa’s innovative, environmental and high-quality plate technology in combination with its superior :ApogeeX workflow makes it the partner-of-choice for implementing our Graphic Enterprise concept," says Seiichi Nishikawa, president of the Nishikawa Group.
"From all the vendors we considered, Agfa Graphics was the only one to offer the solutions that bring us one major step closer to a waste-free and fully automated printing environment. Thanks to the combination of Agfa’s :Azura plate technology and its :Sublima screening technology, Nishikawa will obtain the environmental Gold+ standard in Japan, a major milestone for our company."
