June 26, 2003 -- Las Vegas, Nevada — Newspapers that are under the gun to increase their color capacity but currently don’t have the capital to purchase new presses can now turn to the industry’s leading manufacturer for a cost-effective solution. MAN Roland Inc. has launched a tower add-on program that enables newspapers to upgrade their presses with MAN Roland color technology, regardless of the brand of their existing equipment. The development was announced in conjunction with MAN Roland’s exhibit at NEXPO 2003 — the nation’s premiere newspaper show, conducted by the Newspaper Association of America (NAA). MAN Roland reports that its booth was the scene of considerable traffic and interest. As to the new tower add-on program, the open-ended architecture of MAN Roland’s press control systems and the flexible nature of its advanced shaftless direct-drive technology make the enhancements a profitable strategy for newspapers that need to exploit the rising demand for color advertising. “In the 70s, 80s and early 90s a lot of presses were installed that had only limited color capacity,” says Vincent H. Lapinski, Senior Vice President of Web Operations. “Now they can’t compare to today’s top-line systems which let publishers put color anywhere their advertisers want it. That unfortunately limits their revenue — not something you want to do in today’s economy.” By enhancing their existing press lines with MAN Roland add-on units, newspapers can bring more color and higher quality printing to their pages, without rebuilding their pressrooms from scratch. “Make no mistake. The preferred route is to install a completely new system, but tight capital budgets might not allow that at this time for many papers,” Lapinski explains. “For them, our add-on towers are the next best thing to a new press.” Lapinski sees the tower add-on program as an initial step in a newspaper totally revitalizing itself: “With our tower add-ons, a paper can produce a more colorful, high quality product, which will attract more advertising and widen profit margins. Down the road the added revenues could be invested in a new production system, which will make the product even more appealing and the bottom line even more rewarding.” MAN Roland’s position as the leading manufacturer and installer of newspaper presses puts it in an ideal position to handle the engineering and logistical challenges involved in retrofitting presses with advanced tower ad-ons. “We also have the most productive and highest quality printing units in the business,” Lapinski adds. “So we’re confident we will be the first choice of newspapers who want to add more color to their existing presses.”