•  Europe's biggest photo service provider purchases three versafire CP systems
• Quality, productivity, reliability, and workflow integration tip the scales
• Sale underlines Heidelberg's growth strategy in the digital segment

CEWE Stiftung & Co. KGaA (CEWE), Europe's biggest photo service provider and market leader in online printing based in Oldenburg (www.cewe.de), chose three Versafire CP digital printing systems from Heidelberger Druckmaschinen AG (Heidelberg) at drupa 2016. CEWE plans to use the systems at its European locations in Munich (D), Montpellier (F), and Warwick (UK). The investment decision was preceded by an intensive test phase, which started with the Christmas season and has now been successfully completed. Heidelberg also supports CEWE with a concept to flexibly balance out seasonal fluctuations in the business of the photo service provider.

CEWE specializes in producing personalized photobooks and calendars as well as online printed material for customers all over Europe, generating sales of around EUR 555 million in 2015. The company has around 3,200 employees, and offers both digital and offset printing at 13 locations throughout Europe. The quality requirements are particularly high when it comes to printing photoproducts.

"Satisfied customers are vital to the success of an online business. For CEWE, quality, productivity, reliability and the option of workflow integration are therefore key factors when deciding to invest in a printing system. In addition, the price-performance ratio and the flexibility in terms of our seasonal business must be right too. That's precisely why we opted for Versafire digital printing systems from Heidelberg after intensive tests," says Carsten Heitkamp, COO of CEWE.

"The fact that our Versafire systems have now been chosen by Europe's biggest photo service provider makes us extremely proud, and shows that the systems can satisfy even the most stringent quality requirements. The ability to integrate our digital printing systems into existing workflow environments using the Prinect Digital Frontend is an important deciding factor in many of the sales we close, and was also the case at drupa. This gives us a USP that will enable us to further accelerate our growth course in the digital segment," says Stephan Plenz, Member of the Management Board responsible for Equipment at Heidelberg.

Heidelberg had announced the sale of the 1000th Versafire system worldwide to a customer from Germany just days previously at drupa.