Pierre, you should read this...
DI: When Demand Outstrips Supply
Following its dramatic debut at Drupa '95 in May, the four-color Quickmaster DI (direct imaging) 1338218189 sheetfed press for single-side, short-run printing has been a sales success for Heidelberg. By the end of the show, 265 orders had been booked (113 by Americans), at a stated price of $420,000 each. The order count passed 400 by August, when delivery dates in early 1997 were being quoted.
Thus, manufacturing capacity-the ability to deliver machines to meet market demand-has become a crucial issue.
Factory photos at left show: (top) preparing quadruple-size common impression cylinder, (middle) fitting rollers and cylinders into laid-down side frame, and (bottom) pivoting assembled press into upright position.
''We'll manufacture the DI presses at our factory in Wiesloch and plan to begin serial production in the third quarter, with shipments to begin by the end of 1995,'' reports Marcel Kiessling, Heidelberg's manager of sales marketing for direct imaging products. ''We've never considered maximum capacity to be a problem, but we must be sure to control the ramp-up stage.'' Average output rate, it is thought: one machine per day.
This summer, Kiessling was part of a team visiting prospective buyers in Atlanta and New York to compile recommendations for further development.
Heidelberg plans to demonstrate the Quickmaster DI to U.S. audiences at the Graph Expo '95 show in Chicago next month.
Graphic Arts Monthly September 1995
As the plates have gotten even better all of these owners must be buying supplies from who? Oh I bet it was Presstek. SG eom |
