Hybrid print products are the future. That is why Muller Martini, in line with the buzzword of Finishing 4.0, will demonstrate live at its drupa booth in Hall 2 how variable magazines and books are produced using a fully connected, highly automated machine line-up consisting of sheet-fed offset, web offset and digital printing elements.
Offset and digital printing of magazines and books is one thing, the efficient print finishing of hybrid products is another. With its key drupa topic of Finishing 4.0, Muller Martini will demonstrate in Düsseldorf how signatures from both printing methods can be processed according to a smart workflow on a day-to-day basis. Hundreds of copies of over 20 different print products will be produced live each day using no fewer than nine connected systems to demonstrate the concepts of smart automation and touchless workflow. To enable hybrid products, the print finishing systems must naturally be digital ready. Muller Martini systems have met that requirement for many years. Numerous further developments and new developments will be presented at drupa in all segments (saddle stitchers, perfect binders, thread sewing machines and booklines), such as a brand-new solution for the three-sided trimming of softcover books in ultra-short runs. That will underline Muller Martini’s position as a market leader and innovation leader, and provide visitors to the booth with a glimpse of the future of print finishing.
The complex hybrid products at the Muller Martini booth will include a bilingual “in-flight magazine”, which will be produced sequentially in sets of four copies, with varying page counts, in A4 size using the Presto II Digital saddle stitcher. Since hybrid products are not limited to saddle stitching and are gaining in importance in the softcover segment – especially when it comes to high-quality customized business reports and school materials in the B2B segment – Muller Martini will also present the relevant perfect binding solutions. For instance, a digitally printed book block will be produced using the SigmaLine and fed using the book block feeder to the Alegro perfect binder, which will be showcased in a new digital version at drupa. The hybrid softcover product will be finished with offset signatures that are fed via the gathering machine.
Muller Martini will also be represented at the drupa booths of two digital printing press manufacturers. Two identically configured Presto II Digital saddle stitchers, each with an unwinding system, cross cutting unit (both from Hunkeler) and pocket fold unit (from Heidelberg), will be used at the booths of the Muller Martini partners Canon Océ and Xerox to stitch several of their trade fair products live.
The U.S. company DS Graphics, a Muller Martini customer, which specializes in Variable Data Print (VDP) and uses a Primera Digital saddle stitcher for that purpose, is proof that customized and personalized magazines, brochures and catalogs result in a win-win-win situation. “The publishers save money because they can save distribution losses by using targeted print products, the end customers save time because they only receive products that they are genuinely interested in, and it’s an attractive business model for our company,” says DS Graphics President and CEO Jeff Pallis.
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