HP Announces 100 Series 4 HP Indigo Digital Press Installations Since drupa 2016

An operator at Century Label uses the new HP Indigo 8000 digital press.

ROSEMONT, Ill. — September 13, 2016 — At Labelexpo Americas 2016, HP Inc. is announcing strong worldwide market acceptance of the series 4 HP Indigo digital presses as well as the now commercially available HP Indigo 8000 digital press. HP is also showcasing the HP Indigo Digital Combination Press concept for the first time in the United States, along with its industry-leading labels, shrink sleeves and flexible packaging solutions that are reinventing how converters engage brands.

Reinforcing HP Inc.’s tremendous sales success at drupa 2016, 100 series 4 HP Indigo digital presses, including HP Indigo 10000, 12000, 20000 and 30000 digital presses, purchased at the show have been installed worldwide. Additionally, HP Indigo 8000 digital presses are fully-operational at early customer sites Century Label, Eurostampa and RAKO ETIKETTEN GmbH & Co. just weeks after installation.

Labels and packaging is the company’s fastest-growing graphics segment worldwide, with both digital label and packaging production projected to grow at double-digit percent CAGR.(1) HP is driving a digital labels and packaging revolution among converters and brands with innovative technology like the HP Indigo 8000, WS6800, 20000 and 30000 Digital Presses and changing the rules of label printing with its HP Indigo Digital Combination Press demonstration of fully-integrated, single-pass digital embellishment printing.

"As brands, converters and print providers reevaluate their business models to adapt to changing market conditions, demand for digital labels and packaging solutions is rising, and HP is addressing this demand today by ramping manufacturing and delivering production-ready presses at customer sites worldwide," explains Alon Bar-Shany, GM, Indigo division, HP. “Leveraging HP Indigo’s continuous innovation, our labels and packaging customers are providing world-class brands unprecedented solutions to improve margins, while growing their own businesses by more than 25 percent per year,(2)and driving a fundamental shift in how the printing industry does business.”

Industry’s most productive digital narrow-web press(3) offers customers game-changing economics
Today, HP Indigo customers generate about 70% of the revenue from all digitally-printed pressure-sensitive labels produced worldwide,(4) and that percentage is projected to increase as more converters adopt HP Indigo 8000 digital presses to gain new game-changing efficiencies and capabilities. The HP Indigo 8000 digital press doubles the production speeds of current narrow-web digital presses(5) and is already giving high-volume converters, such as Century Label, Eurostampa and RAKO ETIKETTEN GmbH & Co. a competitive edge.

“As the market becomes educated on digital printing possibilities, more brand owners are demanding it,” says Heidi Chambers, executive director, Century Label. “A major motivating factor in our decision to add the HP Indigo 8000 digital press was its doubled speed; since installing the press in July, we have increased our digital capability to handle longer runs by 125 percent. This enables us to successfully implement our digital strategy in a space that has been traditionally filled by flexographic print.”

Long-time HP Indigo customer and industry leader CCL Label will also install the HP Indigo 8000 digital press this month to increase its productivity and open new revenue streams.

“We have consistently relied on HP Indigo digital presses to achieve the high print quality and unique applications that our customers require,” said Lee Pretsell, group VP, healthcare and specialty worldwide, CCL Industries. “The productivity of the new HP Indigo 8000 Digital Press was the decisive factor to expand the advantages of HP Indigo into new areas of our business.”

To further optimize their workflows, both CCL Label and RAKO ETIKETTEN GmbH & Co. as well as other customers are leveraging PrintOS to simplify and automate print production management across their existing fleets and new HP Indigo 8000 digital presses. The HP Indigo 8000 digital press works seamlessly alongside the flagship HP Indigo WS6800 digital press and the HP Indigo 20000 digital press, offering converters complementary production capabilities.

HP at Labelexpo Americas 2016
In booths 3226 and 3429, HP Inc. is demonstrating its vast labels and packaging portfolio that is empowering converters to redefine labels and packaging standards and offer brands more value.

The HP Indigo 8000 digital press will be on display integrated with the new AVT Helios S Turbo, a high-resolution, high-speed, 100% inspection system. The AVT inspection system connects with the press or an in-line finishing unit and automatically pauses printing when a suspected repeating problem is detected, minimizing waste and enabling immediate problem resolution.

Bringing digital printing advantages to embellishment printing, HP is showcasing the HP Digital Combination Press concept for the first time in the United States in-line with the HP Indigo WS6800 digital press, as seen at drupa 2016. The HP Digital Combination Press is HP’s vision for the future of label combination printing, enabling production of digital embellishments, such as spot and tactile varnishes as well as foils, in a fully-digital, single-pass process. With the solution, digital label converters will no longer have to combine multiple print technologies in one job to achieve certain performance, aesthetic effects or embellishments.

HP is also demonstrating the enhanced HP Indigo 20000 digital press in-line with the AVT Apollo 20K inspection system. The HP Indigo 20000 allows label and flexible packaging converters to print multiple high-quality jobs simultaneously, maximize use of the substrate and optimize production with multi-lane ganging.

Delivering an expanded color gamut, new commercially available inks on display include HP Indigo ElectroInk Premium White, which provides the widest range of opacity levels up to silk screen standards in a single print process, an HP Indigo ElectroInk fade-resistant ink set and HP Indigo ElectroInk Fluorescent Pink. HP Indigo ElectroInks allow converters to meet strict brand standards with perfect color registration – a key competitive differentiator.

“In the past, we had to use multiple hits of white ink to achieve the desired brightness demanded by our clients, which slowed our productivity,” explains Rich Butcher Jr., digital production manager, Dion Label Printing. “Easy-to-use HP Indigo ElectroInk Premium White ink allows us to produce high-quality labels that feature brighter whites with fewer ink layers at increased press speeds, which has helped us improve performance and extend consumable life.”

The booth also features dedicated areas for PrintOS, HP Indigo Pack Ready technology, HP SmartStream Mosaic, HP security solutions, as well as dozens of applications from leading customers and brands. HP Specialty Printing Systems is also demonstrating long-time original equipment manufacturer (OEM) partner Afinia Label’s new digital full-color label printer, the L301. Powered by HP technology, the L301 is a compact, on-demand, high-impact label printer for small businesses that provides exceptional color and rich blacks.

(1)      According to HP Indigo labels and packaging financial projections, L&P hardware and supplies revenues have grown by double-digit percentages since FY’15, and double-digit percentage growth is projected to continue into FY’17.  
(2)      According to HP Internal customer data, labels and packaging print volume on HP Indigo WS4000 series, WS6000 series and series 4 digital presses has grown approximately 25 percent YoY since FY’11.
(3)      According to HP Internal and independent market data, the HP Indigo 8000 Digital Press is the fastest fully-digital narrow-web label press, reaching 80 minutes per minute in Enhanced Productivity Mode (EPM).
(4)      According to HP Internal competitive hardware value market share data for Q2 FY’16, HP Indigo customers generate about 70 percent of the revenue from all digitally-printed pressure-sensitive labels produced worldwide.
(5)      The HP Indigo 8000 Digital Press offers high-volume converters end-to-end label production at doubled speeds up to 80 meters per minute (m/min.) or 262 feet per minute (fpm) in EPM compared to the HP Indigo WS6800 Digital Press, which prints up to 40 m/min. or 130 fpm.

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Source: HP.