Another industry leader has announced a major commitment to both the publishing industry and the future of digital book manufacturing.  Worldcolor, the global manufacturer of nearly one billion books annually, today announced the purchase of Muller Martini's SigmaLine, along with Kodak's Prosper 5000 XL Press featuring continuous inkjet technology to be installed in their Dubuque, Iowa facility.  This technological pairing well positions Worldcolor to be on the cutting edge of digital print solutions.

Worldcolor's adoption of Muller Martini's SigmaLine technology emphasizes the growing need for printers to provide their customers with sophisticated digital services.  Today's publishing market is intensely competitive and driven by economic mandates to decrease obsolescence waste, reduce forecasting risks and better manage inventories.  The result?  A clear opportunity for book manufacturers to complement traditional offset operations with high-speed, short-run digital capabilities.

Innovative SigmaLine technology interconnects prepress, digital printing and finishing in a unique total system that permits fully automated production from a PDF to a finished book in a single operation.  Worldcolor's purchase entails a number of all in-line SigmaLine components, including the SigmaFolder fully format variable signature folder, SigmaCollator for book block creation, the revolutionary SigmaBuffer and a perfect binding line with SigmaBinder, SigmaTower and SigmaTrimmer.  The SigmaBuffer is an exciting new technology that intelligently decouples the print, fold and collating operations from binding and trimming while simultaneously connecting them in-line.  This results in the highest efficiency and productivity of such a complete system.  The total digital solution is managed by Muller Martini's end-to-end workflow system Connex.

One of the key features of Muller Martini's Digital Solutions is its scalable capabilities, which allows printers to seamlessly expand their SigmaLine configurations in order to address both today's and tomorrow's digital printing requirements.  This allows Worldcolor to initially implement the perfect binding line within their existing digital operation, before they add the Kodak Prosper 5000 XL high-speed inkjet and the SigmaLine's signature folding and collating technology in-line without any alterations to the already installed components.  Muller Martini's Digital Solutions can offer a broad range of in-line systems for digital production such as integrated higher range perfect binders or integrated saddle stitching or hardcover capabilities to further enhance customers' future requirements.

Gary Durand, Executive Vice President of Operations for Worldcolor, commented, "The addition of SigmaLine technology within our organization signifies a clear recognition that digital book manufacturing is on the rise – and here to stay.  Moreover, we recognize that the productivity demanded by inkjet digital technology warrants the highly unique capabilities of the in-line SigmaLine solutions.  Worldcolor will continue to meet the evolving demands of our publishing partners, and we're very pleased to offer them the world's finest advancements in digital finishing technology from Muller Martini."

Said Bruno Muller, Chief Executive Officer of Muller Martini, "This is a significant investment from Worldcolor.  It underscores that Muller Martini is not simply a manufacturer of bindery equipment, but an innovative, technological solutions provider that continues to meet our industry's challenges.  We expect others to look closely at digital book manufacturing alternatives that not only enhance the economical production of short-run books, but capitalize on the new revenue opportunities being generated by digital printing."