Halle/ Westfalen - As the interface between the international brand-name goods industry and its print service providers, Flexicon understands the needs of both target groups very well: they all want the best possible quality in product packaging. But though the objective is clear, to date the way forward has not been. Flexicon has now forged a new path with Flexicon PrintAnalyzer, which connects the quality managers of all parties involved through an online database.

Where even the trained eye of an experienced print technician could not see the difference, Flexicon's previous control tool Inkpilot was not fooled: every printing process was scanned, the substrate and colour applications were recorded and the full and half-tones were measured colourimetrically and compared with the prescribed reference values.

But the further development of this tool, PrintAnalyzer, can do even more: values that are recorded with every printing process flow into an online database and can be analysed with reference to every single parameter. Thus, for example, the print service provider receives information about the dot gain on item xy across multiple print runs with the same plate set, or about the effects of changing plates. Or about the colour properties of various printing plate materials or the quality of plates from various suppliers, to name just a few examples.

All this ensures that the quality of the packaging print is not only more visible, but sustainably improvable as well. "As soon as our basic data is comprehensive enough, we can start, step by step, to exploit the remaining potential for the strongest-selling product packaging", says Bernd Sanning, who heads up the Service & Innovation department at Flexicon. His team spent 17 months developing the new software.

Yet Flexicon's new PrintAnalyzer is also interesting for the brand-name goods industry: manufacturers can connect all their packaging suppliers to this web-based system, and automatically have their packaging available in a digitally dimensioned form. This makes it easy to analyse all the printing results, and means that the tedious dispatch and receipt of reports via e-mail is no longer necessary. Together with the finishers, everyone can work on optimising each product bit by bit until it is perfect. Log-ins for the new web application can be ordered immediately from Flexicon. The monthly fee also includes updates.

For more information please visit us at www.flexicon.de.