With seven employees, Grafostampa Rolli produces a wide assortment commercial printing. When Mr. Ludovico Rolli, Grafostampa Rolli’s managing director decided to switch from conventional thermal plates to :Azura plates, Grafostampa Rolli became the first printer in Italy to choose the chemistry-free system from Agfa, and among the first to prove that :Azura works as well on non-Agfa CtP systems. Beta Tester Becomes Early Adopter As one of the world’s first users of Agfa’s advanced thermal plate system, Grafostampa Rolli has proven the viability of the chemistry-free process. Unlike other CtP systems, Agfa’s ThermoFuse technology has been easy to use. Grafostampa Rolli took the opportunity to test Agfa’s new plates and soon became an Agfa partner. Working closely with Agfa, Grafostampa Rolli replaced the conventional thermal plate system with the :Azura. “With our Lotem 400 CtP device and Agfa’s :Azura chemistry-free system, we maintained the same productivity and saved a lot in chemical products,” Rolli said. Besides the costs savings, the final decision for Rolli came down to being able to use a chemistry-free system to deliver consistent results; and :Azura delivered. Before :Azura, Rolli said, if he had to made a special print, he had to insert the new chemical one week before the actual production of the plates. Now he can do every job at any time with no problems on press. “I could easily forget I have this system: it is always ready, it doesn’t consume energy and it does not need to be powered off over the weekend, only to be powered on when the work week begins again. Above all, it doesn’t need weekly maintenance like my old processor and chemical products,” Rolli said. The Benefits of Chemistry-Free :Azura is a grained and anodised aluminium thermal plate that uses patented ThermoFuse technology to physically bond images to the plate without any chemical processing. A clean-out step follows the non-ablative imaging process to enhance contrast. The result is highly stable and predictable thermal imaging, without any compromises on press. :Azura plates offer high quality (2-98% dots on plate) imaging for printers using 2-, 4- and 8-up formats. :Azura and its ThermoFuse technology allow printers to eliminate water and developer from the CtP process. As a result, the :Azura system can be quite beneficial to a printer’s bottom line and more environmentally sensitive. For example, with :Azura, a typical 4-up printer would only use a small container of gum per month, versus traditional CtP systems that use thousands of gallons of water, developer and finisher. This could save printers thousands of dollars each year.