At IPEX 2010, which is taking place in Birmingham in the U.K. from May 18 to 25, Heidelberger Druckmaschinen AG (Heidelberg) will be unveiling details of a partnership program for cooperation with manufacturers of the Management Information Systems (MIS). The aim is to enable users to boost their productivity by further improving the interfaces between third-party MIS systems and the Prinect print shop workflow from Heidelberg. Such interfaces are already in use in a number of successful customer projects. Heidelberg and MIS manufacturers CERM, EFI, Printplus and Tharstern have now agreed a framework for such collaboration. In all cases, the interplay between Prinect and the MIS systems from these suppliers is based on the JDF format as defined in the CIP4 organization's ICS specification.

"We are already working on implementing the JDF interface with around 50 manufacturers of MIS systems in more than 400 separate customer projects. Some 200 Prinect systems with links to third-party MIS systems are already in operation or on the point of being completed. In many cases, though, we can see that it is not possible to take full advantage of the functions offered by the JDF connection," explains Marcel Kiessling, Management Board member responsible for Services at Heidelberg. "We have therefore decided to invite MIS manufacturers with particularly well-developed JDF interfaces to work with us to help maximize the possible range of functions and to provide long-term support in delivering further developments to existing workflow environments," he adds.

For example, the interface between Prinect and the MIS business partners does not just support job creation via JDF. It also transfers process schedules and layout data from MIS to Prinect, evaluates these, and provides comprehensive feedback of production data from Prinect to the MIS systems for job tracking and actual costing. All these processes are undergoing further optimization. One particular aim of the cooperation is to enhance the interplay between MIS and Prinect in specific applications such as jobs with versioning or gang forms.

The capabilities of the interfaces between Prinect and the MIS business partners are already impressive and will be expanded further in the future. This will give Heidelberg customers a clear idea of the possibilities offered by open systems. The program is open to additional partners.