Swanline Print’s Nick Kirby (middle) with HP’s Stephen Nigro and Xavier Garcia and the FB10000.

Not only did HP announce a major new press in its range of Scitex industrial presses at FESPA, it also revealed the name of the first UK company to invest in the new technology.  

Swanline Print Ltd in Staffordshire, a trade supplier of laminated packaging and point of sale (POS) displays, has purchased the first HP Scitex FB10000 Industrial Press in the UK, and will use it to provide in-house, high quality short to medium run packaging and POS services.

This investment will enable Swanline to print directly onto an increased range of light and heavy-weight substrates for a greater variety of jobs, opening up new business opportunities and realising production efficiencies compared to offset litho plate production and substrate pre-treatment.

‘Quite simply, the HP Scitex FB10000 Industrial Press reinforces our ability to serve the packaging and POS market,’ said Nick Kirby, managing director of Swanline Print. ‘Our current business is split 60 per cent packaging and 40 per cent POS, and this investment will improve our service levels to a standard that competes with traditional analogue technologies.’

‘With the digital printing capability, we have the opportunity to version, regionalise or personalise customer jobs. For POS, with reduced run-lengths for seasonal campaigns, for example, and more targeted promotions, we expect this press to be a powerful tool to meet customer demands and attract new business.’

The HP Scitex FB10000 uses six colour UV-curable inks and the company’s High Dynamic Range Printing Technology. The wide format of the press supports up to four B1 prints in one pass, giving Swanline the capability to design packaging in fewer pieces and significantly reduce gluing and finishing requirements.It can produce 1000 B1 sheets in less than two hours.

Designed to address offset, screen and digital applications using UV-curable inks, the press has exceptionally wide media versatility and prints to substrates such as foam board, foam PVC, corrugated cardboard and compressed cardboard, and ACP (Aluminium Composite Panels).