04/04/2006 -- The postpress operations at the Krefeld folding carton plant of Friedrich Freund GmbH have recently been integrated into a JDF-based production workflow. The integration concept is based on the Prinect Data Control production and information system from Heidelberger Druckmaschinen AG (Heidelberg) and the industry-specific management information system "Boxsoft". The postpress machines - a Heidelberg Dymatrix 106 CSB die-cutter and a Diana Pro 74 folder gluer - are now integrated with the two six-color Heidelberg Speedmaster CD 102 presses in one complete JDF workflow. "The complete integration of press and postpress offers huge potential for increasing productivity in packaging printing and in other sectors," emphasizes Jörg Bauer, Head of Product Management Prinect at Heidelberg. "By introducing a JDF workflow based on Prinect Data Control, we were able to enhance the flexibility and efficiency of production in the Freund print shop. The increased transparency of production was equally as important for Freund, since this has just as positive an impact on customer loyalty as error reduction and analysis of the production processes." The process of integrating the postpress operations began in 2005 with the procurement of a second Heidelberg Speedmaster CD 102 and its installation in the Prinect Data Control workflow. Heidelberg worked together with Freund to develop a concept for integrating the postpress in the workflow too. "We were highly impressed by the role of Data Control in shortening our press make-ready times and also wanted to introduce the advantages to our postpress machines," explains Production Manager Michael Raschke. The postpress machines have been fully integrated in Data Control via JDF since March 2006 as part of a field test. Every repeat job is stored separately in the Data Control database. "We follow the same procedure in die-cutting and gluing as we do in printing - the optimal machine settings from a particular job are stored centrally as reference values and can be called up any time regardless of the operator," explains Raschke. "This means we can immediately finish follow-on jobs in the quickest time possible."