Between the IPEX and drupa trade shows, manroland is stepping on the gas: during the informative pit stops around the Sheetfed Summit course, the visitors experienced many exciting moments concerning new presses, technologies, and applications. The bottom line: at the end of the race, every customer had the right to feel like the winner.

Print lives and works. This sentence from the introductory address by Dr. Markus Rall, member of the manroland Executive Board and responsible for the Sheetfed Printing Systems Business Sector, perfectly expressed the message of the Sheetfed Summit. The visitors expressed great interest in the numerous innovations; one highlight was followed by the next. The new ROLAND 700 DirectDrive platform for instance, that permits a production speed of 18,000 sheets per hour and job changeover in less than three minutes, made a huge impact.

Another topic that held the guests spellbound was autoprint smart. This technology provides automated sequential production of preselected jobs without any operator intervention. Yet another highlight: the perfect delivery stack and here ROLAND InlineInspector 2.0 with its high-resolution camera system was presented. It analyzes even the smallest lines of type right down to six point, inspects every sheet, makes a PDF comparison, and masks zones for different measuring sensitivity levels.

Large-format printing fascinated the visitors as well: the perfecting system for the ROLAND 900, XXL was a big hit, primarily for printing companies engaged in high-volume commercial printing. Several presses including two that were in operation during the event were sold in the course of the week. The four-color ROLAND 700 HiPrint is going to China and the five-color ROLAND 200 high-pile with coating module to Italy.

First joint presentation by manroland and Océ
Océ, manroland's new digital printing partner, presented two highly productive inkjet systems with the focus on workflow integration and Web-to-Print. The recently formed alliance unites the advantages of offset and digital printing. It was the first time that Océ showed one of its latest developments in digital high-performance printing to an offset audience – the full color printing system Océ ColorStream 3500. Designed for printing with variable data, the Twin concept and intelligent performance features permit simple changeover from black/white printing to full color that opens up new business models.

"The Sheetfed Summit was a great opportunity for us to show how well offset and digital printing complement each other", says Sebastian Landesberger, Executive Vice President Océ Production Printing.

In pole position with manroland
The guests were full of praise for the event and reported on the success they are having with their own manroland presses. Thomas Höfling who works in customer support at Druck- und Verlagshaus Zarbock in Frankfurt: "In recent times I have been more often in the pressroom at our new five-color ROLAND 700 DirectDrive LV. The InlineColorPilot system in particular is really sensational! Such constant inking was earlier unimaginable. This stirs an old printer's blood and sometimes I really feel like running a press myself again… I think that with this press manroland has produced the ideal combination of heavy metal and high-tech that will help us move forward. Compliments to your company!"

Gerhard Widmann, Printing Department Manager at Offsetdruckerei Schwarzach in Austria: "I find the event very interesting and today we saw a number of innovations. Above all, I think the camera system is super. It is also a big step forward that one is now able to print at 18,000 sheets per hour with a manroland press. The perfecting system in format 8 is very impressive; I've never seen anything like it before. I also think the cooperation with Océ is a very positive development, especially for short runs."

Klaus Kalwinsky, Works Manager at Wanfried-Druck Kalden, adds: "The seven-color ROLAND 700 LTTLV has been remarkable for me since 2007. What this press has produced so far is unbelievable. Compared with older presses, I am very impressed by the product quality, production quality even at maximum speed, and the register accuracy. The press has a unique position in the market. I really like the Sheetfed Summit, and we will be looking at digital printing before long. In packaging printing it is interesting for samples."