Next-generation print production workflow software now available worldwide; brings new vision for prepress production while reducing pre-planning costs 

ROCHESTER, N.Y. - Powerful print production workflow software is essential for print service providers facing tight margins and looking to diversify their businesses with value-added services. Kodak is addressing these challenges with the launch of its KODAK PRINERGY Workflow Version 6, the next generation of the world’s industry-leading workflow software. Now released worldwide, PRINERGY Workflow 6 represents a completely new vision for prepress production. It brings a new level of automation, accuracy and efficiency to print creation, while reducing costs in the pre-planning print stage and expanding product integration across Kodak and third-party solutions. PRINERGY Workflow is the leading solution for commercial, packaging and publication printers seeking to centralize—and automate—print production. 

“We visited hundreds of customers around the world to understand where their challenges are and what they want to do in the future,” said Jon Bracken, General Manager of KODAK Unified Workflow Solutions. “What came up time and time again from customers is how they need to drive greater cost out of their processes while enhancing quality and increasing revenue with new digital products. 

“PRINERGY Workflow 6 focuses on integrating the production planning process and reducing the time spent by customer service representatives, production planners and prepress operators preparing optimized production plans. The result is tighter quality control, fewer manual touchpoints and lower production costs for both digitally and conventionally printed jobs.

PRINERGY Workflow 6 is the hub of an automated, integrated prepress workflow, which includes KODAK PREPS Imposition Software Version 7, KODAK COLORFLOW Color Software Version 2, and KODAK INSITE Prepress Portal Version 6.6. This next generation of solutions will continue to deliver efficiency improvements and cost reductions throughout the production cycle.  

New streamlined interface for integrated job control

PRINERGY Workflow 6 introduces a new streamlined productivity-focused interface, called Workspace. With its at-a-glance overview of prepress production, and easy-to-learn Manage, Plan and Track modules, Workspace makes it simpler for a broader set of users to drive standard sheetwork jobs to press. Workspace can be accessed from any web browser and broadens the point of entry for users. Customers will have the freedom to use the new Workspace interface, which will be evolving and enhanced in coming versions, and can continue to rely on the existing Workshop interface for unrestricted access to devices, features, automation controls and reporting.

The PRINERGY Workflow 6 Workspace Plan, Manage and Track modules help organize the myriad of information and tasks that PRINERGY Software offers. It also includes new capabilities that take automation to the next level, extending automation upstream to the customer’s order and downstream to digital presses and computer to plate (CTP) devices. Scenario functionality allows printers to set up and save a chain of tasks associated with a certain printing press or set of production conditions, which can then be used to handle specific sets of production jobs by simply hitting a play button. In addition, intent-driven automation uses the basic description of the job—or its intent—to drive automated processing through every step of production. 

More than 45 PRINERGY Workflow customers are winners of the 2013 Print Excellence Awards hosted by Printing Industries Association, Inc.  To see why PRINERGY Workflow was awarded the first-ever GRAPH EXPO MUST SEE ‘EM Legacy Award, hear customer testimonials, and learn about additional features and benefits of the next revolution in workflow, visit www.kodak.com/go/prinergy6. 

Commentary by Cary Sherburne

PRINERGY Workflow 6 and Workspace have been in the works for about three years.  This major overhaul will bring PRINERGY more in line with the growing number of workflow offerings now in the marketplace in terms of ease of use.  KODAK’s Bracken, in a conversation with WhatTheyThink, reports that the software has been under extensive customer evaluation and in beta testing for about 5 months to “make sure it is rock solid.”

Bracken continues, “PRINERGY 6 has a radically different user interface in Workspace. But we have taken great pains to make sure that everything they are used to in the previous release (Workshop) continues to work with PRINERGY 6.  This way, customers don’t have to retrain everyone on Day One. We also wanted to make sure our customers were ready for the upgrade.  This will often include the need for them to update on-site resources such as computers and operating systems.”

Bracken indicates that with its new Plan/Manage/Track panes, Workspace is a much simpler, more streamlined browser-based user interface, adding, “Plan is brand-new and takes a job definition from JDF job intent or job specifications created within the system. The PRINERGY database includes a resource database of CTP systems, digital presses and finishing equipment. The system logic matches a job against the equipment you have in your portfolio and allows the operator to choose a predefined scenario that best fits the job or to modify it accordingly. This will be much more straightforward for operators than previous PRINERGY versions and limit the amount of involvement superusers will need to have on a daily basis.”

As another objective for the project, Bracken explains, “In addition to making operations easier for the typical user, we have also tried to make PRINERGY the best possible client of a print MIS system, sending information downstream to the press and bi-directionally to the MIS.”

PREPS Imposition Software 7 and COLORFLOW Software Version 2 are also being released at the same time.