In the past three drupa, events one of the major areas of new product announcements has been in the area of computer to plate (CtP). This year however we have heard very little about this subject from the suppliers. Most of the new announcements this drupa have been about digital printing and in particular about inkjet printing.

Why is this situation with CtP and does this mean that there is nothing new in this area of the market. First of all I understand that the growth in the market that we have seen in the last 13 years has now reduced and on a year on year basis there are less new CtP devices sold. This shows that CtP has now become really well established in most printers and in North America, Western Europe, Japan and parts of the Far East. Today the major areas for purchasing of CtP are the smaller printers and the printers in the BRIC (Brazil, Russia, India, China) countries. We are also now in a replacement market where first and second generation CtP devices are being replaced with faster and more powerful new devices.
At drupa this year I think we shall see the following trends in the CtP area.

• Chemistry and process free plates - This area of business is now switching from the smaller printers with a low level requirement for plates to the larger printers. We shall see two main areas of development here. The first is an increase in performance of the thermal process and chemistry free plates from Agfa, Fujifilm and Kodak. Up to now only the Fuji Brillia Pro T plate has imaged at the same speed as conventional CtP plates, but now the speed of the other plates is being increased. The second area of development is the arrival of the chemistry free violet plates from Agfa and Fujifilm. This is a major development for the violet market as it takes out the variable element of chemistry plate processing and turns these plates into being true digital plates. These plates appear superior to the process and chemistry free thermal plates in areas of imaging speed and run lengths on the press. This generates the question whether this will cause a change in the choice of CtP technology for printers in switching away from thermal imaging to violet imaging. Personally I think this will not happen as it is too late and printers are very happy with the thermal imaging technology. The benefits of lower costs that violet chemistry free technology will give are not really significant in the greater view of printing costs when one takes into account the small share of printing costs that plate making takes up.


• Larger format CtP engines - We are seeing a step up in size of offset presses from a number of suppliers going to 114 x 53 inches (2,900 x 1,350 mm). To cater for this a number of suppliers will be showing ULF (Ultra Large Format) CtP engines. These include the Screen Ultima 48000 and the Agfa Avalon N48. Heidelberg is also introducing larger format versions of its Suprasetter range with the Suprasetter 145, 162 and 190 engines. The largest of these images plates with a maximum width of 1,900 mm and these all have enhanced multi-beam imaging modules to provide for the high performance. Kodak is also going up in size and its latest Magnus XLF 80 platesetter for 80 page plate formats. Screen are claiming that there new Ultima 48000 is the largest CtP engine in the market but like so many supplier claims this one is incorrect. The largest CtP engine in the market has been around for some time and these new CtP engines are just joining it at the top of the market. The largest device is the BasysPrint UV-Setter Series 1642 that takes plates of up to 125 x 60 inches (3,170 x 1,535 mm). This is a device that images conventional plates using a UV exposure systems. The first of these devices is already in operation in Finland.


• Higher performance violet engines - A number of the suppliers are bringing out upgraded violet based CtP engines with higher power violet diodes. This will allow the new violet chemistry free plates to be imaged at high speed. Announcements have already been made in this area by ECRM with their MAKO 2x, 4x and 8x platesetters that have 120 milliwatt laser diodes in them. I fully expect other suppliers of violet CtP engines using this 120 milliwatt diode exposure system to announce products at drupa.


• UV Imaging of conventional plates - This is a market that has been established by BasysPrint since 1995. Recently Lüscher introduced a UV version of its platesetter range and this has been a major success. Today Lüscher has delivered over 100 of these systems and has a full order book for new systems. It hardly sells any thermal systems today. BasysPrint is introducing a new series of its UV-Setters with the UV-Setter 400 and 800 models. These are completely redesigned and take in many developments from its parent Punch Graphix in the manufacture of the Agfa Polaris, the world's leading newspaper CtP system. These are attractive systems for both their speed of operation and the use of existing lower cost conventional printing plates.

  



• Flexo CtP systems - This is a market that has largely been dominated by EskoArtwork for many years with the Cyrel CDI imagers. At drupa together with their partner DuPont they will show a new innovation with single pass imaging of plates with both the laser exposure of the mask and UV exposure of the plate being carried out at the same time. The benefits of this are both speed and efficiency. The efficiency comes in plate handling as the imaged plate from the imager is fully finished and hardened and not susceptible to damage. They will also show imaging of flexo sleeves directly in an imager. Kodak will also be showing their new developments in flexo CtP with the Flexcel NXDigital Flexographic System. Kodak has been showing the capabilities of this technology to allow flexp printing to match both offset and gravure printing for quality.