TOKYO, Japan - Seiko Epson Corporation and Loftware, the respective global leaders in color label printers and enterprise labeling and artwork management solutions, today announced a strategic partnership that aims to revolutionize customers' labeling workflows.

The partnership will integrate the Epson ColorWorks series of color label printers with Loftware's NiceLabel Cloud platforms. Businesses will be able to print from NiceLabel Cloud directly to Epson ColorWorks cloud-connected printers. As a result, businesses will be able to reduce their reliance on IT, cut the number of print errors, and reduce the cost and inventory of pre-printed labels.

The partnership between Epson and Loftware was forged following a sharp increase in demand for high-productivity color labeling solutions as businesses invested in supply chain improvements during and after the COVID-19 pandemic. Demand has particularly grown among companies that employ SAP EH&S ERP systems and who plan to migrate to S/4 HANA and the cloud. These businesses operate across multiple industry segments including chemicals, medical devices, pharmaceuticals, electronics, automotive, aerospace, and retail, and who manage production, warehouse, and distribution facilities.

The Epson-Loftware collaboration meets growing demand from businesses for the use of color on products, cartons and pallet labels for identification. In addition, companies in the chemical (GHS), medical device, and pharmaceutical segments are faced with the urgent need to comply with international labeling regulations requiring color.

Companies that use 2-step printing (figure 1) to print color labels can now move to lower cost and error-reduced 1-step, on-demand color label printing (figure 2). This 1-step printing is enabled by the integration of Epson color label printers with Loftware's NiceLabel Cloud platforms.

Customers:
Can print labels efficiently and quickly, without missing production and shipping deadlines.
No longer need to purchase higher cost, pre-printed, custom, short-run labels, but can use low cost, standard, blank label stocks.
No longer need to manage the inventory and urgent procurement of custom label stocks.
Reduce waste by eliminating leftover, unused label stocks when the label format changes.

"Readiness to adapt to cloud trends is critical," said Junkichi Yoshida, Executive Officer and COO of the Printing Solutions Division at Epson. "Our goal is to drive the growth of color on-demand printing in various kinds of businesses and applications by further enhancing the quality of our label print technology and optimizing both hardware and solutions. This partnership with Loftware is essential for our future business development, since by providing Cloud print, our Colorworks printers can connect to the systems of enterprise customers across multiple industries."

"We're partnering with Epson to help businesses of all sizes move their labeling into the cloud," said Paul Vogt, VP of Channel and Alliance Strategies at Loftware. "Businesses are adopting best-of-breed partner labeling solutions and 1-step color label printing to bring radical improvements to their supply chain printing operations. We're delighted to collaborate with Epson to deliver such transformation."

Epson and Loftware will co-operate to develop cloud-based 1-step color printing solutions to further improve print efficiency and ease-of-use. The companies will lower barriers for on-demand color label printing through seamless integration with SAP and other leading business systems.

Find out more:
epson.com/colorworks-color-label-printers 
www.epson.eu/verticals/business-solutions-for-professional-graphics/colorworks