Dantex has launched the PicoColour II high-speed UV inkjet digital label press, developed together with JF Machines Limited, which now a part of the Dantex Group.
JF Machines (JFM) was established 25 years ago in Kettering by John and Joanna Furley, manufacturing narrow width digital label printing presses under the PicoColour name. John Furley, who is a mechanical and electronic systems engineer, will act as product designer and continue to advance the development of the PicoColour range. As part of Dantex Group, the digital team has now developed the enhanced PicoColour Mk II digital press at 210 mm width, which will be on display at Labelexpo Europe 2015.
Dantex, already a well established specialist supplier of waterwash photopolymer plates and processing equipment, has been making great strides into the digital print arena, and is now set to bring its own range of digital presses to market. JFM is now part of Dantex Group and has become the R & D centre for digital press development.
John Furley, commented, ‘Dantex’s extensive knowledge of the label industry together with their considerable customer base and sales and service infrastructure is what JFM needed in order to market our already very popular product portfolio, as well as to accelerate our research and development efforts to make ever more advanced machines. I am confident that our long-standing customers, as well as our staff, will enjoy working together with the Dantex team. We are delighted with this bold new step forward for JFM.’
Richard Danon, Dantex group chairman, stated, ‘We are really delighted with our new partnership with JFM, and very much look forward to working together. This acquisition has brought Dantex the expertise necessary to be able to build state of the art label printing presses using high-speed UV inkjet technology. The PicoColour II at 210 mm will be our first offering, which will be launched at Label Expo 2015. Press manufacturing will be based at our premises in the Leeds/Bradford area, which has a long history of working with the printing industry. We are very excited about the prospects ahead, as we blend the considerable talents and technology of Dantex with those of JFM.’
Mr Danon added, ‘We will support and expand our products so that our customers can continue to enjoy the technical innovations our digital team is able to bring. We have been working with the label printing industry for almost 50 years and this latest step is the confirmation of moving forward into the 21st Century.’
He continued, ‘PicoColour is the culmination of the joint hard work of all our partners in this project. A close working relationship has helped to bring about this excellent result. PicoColour II UV Digital Press offers a printing width of 210 mm and runs up to 35 m/min. It is a versatile, high quality, highly productive printing system.’
Andrew Abbott, UK sales director of Dantex added, ‘The introduction of our digital press offering to the label industry is a natural next step for Dantex. We started our high tech offerings with Torelief letterpress plates, followed by our digital plates, and now, we are offering a digital press solution to our customers. We are extremely proud that this important technological step is part of Dantex’s manufacturing capabilities.’
Mr Abbott continued, ‘We have been keeping all JFM’s existing customers up to date with our latest technological developments during this period of transition and are very confident that they will be impressed by what we have to show them.’
The PicoColour II is priced exceptionally competitively and offers superb printed results. The PicoColour system works with UV based inks and is available with CMYK + White. The white is exceptionally brilliant and is a single-pass application. Used in conjunction with optional corona treatment, the machine can be used for paper as well as filmic based media.
Benjamin Danon, senior group director in charge of Dantex’s export market operation says, ‘It is now well accepted that print runs are becoming shorter, making a digital press offering a real necessity. We see a growing opportunity in all our markets for the PicoColour II. Many of our customers are under pressure to offer shorter runs and must become more flexible to meet the demand of print buyers. We are confident that our PicoColour range of equipment will be an ideal solution for our customer base in meeting these challenges.’
Sales of PicoColour II UV digital press will begin in the UK, followed by Germany, France, Poland, Austria, Belgium, Holland, Switzerland and the United States. Parallel to this, Dantex will be training its dealership network so that the benefits of the PicoColour II can be offered and supported worldwide in the fastest possible timeframe.
The press is commercialised and will be available from September 2015.
