VANCOUVER, B.C.-Aug. 22, 2001--CreoScitex, a division of Creo Products Inc., announces a major sale of seven Trendsetter NEWS computer-to-plate systems to Gruppo Seregni, a leading company in the Italian newspaper printing business. Newspaper publishers around the world are discovering the Trendsetter NEWS system, the first thermal platesetter developed exclusively for newspaper applications. The Trendsetter NEWS platesetter is the industry's fastest thermal system, imaging more than 200 plates per hour with the award-winning SQUAREspot(TM) thermal imaging head for supreme quality and consistency from plate to plate. Gruppo Seregni owns nine different Italian printing companies, including SIES, NUOVA SAME, SATIM and STS. Six months after installing two CreoScitex thermal CTP systems at SIES, Gruppo Seregni purchased seven additional Trendsetter NEWS platesetters during Grafitalia 2001, Italy's printing and prepress industry trade show. The first of the new platesetters will join the two already in production at the Milan plant of SIES for publishing Il Giornale, Libero, L'Unita, Leggo Milano, Bloomberg Investimenti and Borsa & Finanza. "We were impressed with the imaging quality of the SQUAREspot(TM) thermal heads and the fact that we can now work in full daylight conditions with no plate-exposure concerns,'' says Giuseppe Marchetti, Factory Manager of SIES. "The CreoScitex team is very professional and is helping us to develop solutions. They work with us as a partner.'' The Milan plant of NUOVA SAME will install three Trendsetter NEWS systems for printing Il Giorno, La Stampa, Tuttotris, Lo Sportman and La Gazzetta di Lecco. The fifth Trendsetter NEWS system will be installed in Milan by SATIM, which prints Il Mattino di Napoli, La Padania, Il Popolo and Sport e Scommesse. STS, a large newspaper publisher in Catania that prints local editions of Il Corriere della Sera, La Gazzetta dello Sport, La Stampa, Il Giornale, Libero, Italia Oggi and Milano e Finanza will install the last two platesetters. Several other Italian newspaper publishers also recently invested in the Trendsetter NEWS platesetter. Litosud purchased two systems for its Rome facility, and another for its Bergamo operation. Il Messaggero Veneto of Udine purchased two, and Il Piccolo of Trieste and Diffusioni Grafiche of Alessandria each purchased one system. Newspaper printers have been quick to recognize the benefits of the Trendsetter NEWS systems with its quality imaging and high-speed plate production. Available in four models, the Trendsetter NEWS system loads and unloads plates automatically and uses a flexible, standard file-format interface to newspaper production systems. Optimized for speed without sacrificing quality, the models produce from 70 broadsheet plates per hour to over 200 broadsheet plates per hour to meet the most demanding needs of any newspaper printer. The accuracy of CreoScitex SQUAREspot thermal imaging heads offers greater consistency and repeatability than other plate-imaging methods, and allows for increased throughput, product quality, and profitability. Trendsetter NEWS Imaging Plates Around the World Other new Trendsetter NEWS system owners include Amper Druck in Germany. In Asia Pacific, one of Singapore's largest printers, KHL Printing Co Pte Ltd, installed two Trendsetter NEWS systems for the production of the Today Newspaper. FEP Printing Corporation, one of the Philippines' largest printers, also purchased the Trendsetter NEWS platesetter for the production of The Inquirer, the country's largest newspaper. In the Americas, publishers of The Hartford Courant of Hartford, Connecticut and The Salt Lake Tribune of Salt Lake City, Utah, have each installed a Trendsetter NEWS system. In Maricaibo, Venezuela, C.A. Diario Panorama installed two Trendsetter NEWS systems to produce their daily newspaper.