White Stone, VA, April 2004— The 2004 R&E Council of NAPL Digital Smart Factory Forum—billed as CIM and Much, Much More—will be held at the MGM Grand Hotel in Las Vegas, Nevada, from June 30 to July 2, 2004. The seminar is a venue at which printers, their suppliers, and their customers can learn how to take the next steps in automation and workflow implementation. The meeting will include speakers from companies large and small, and will outline how printing companies can provide better customer service, lock in customer relationships, and produce more with less labor, lower waste, and fewer mistakes. In addition, industry experts will discuss, debate, and dissect the latest technologies shown at Drupa 2004 only a few weeks prior to the meeting. Of particular interest will be discussions of how to deal with legacy equipment. Among the featured speakers is EFI Chairman and CEO Guy Gecht, who will discuss Enhancing The Competitiveness Of Print Through The Digital Smart Factory. Neil O’Callaghan, Senior Vice President of Operations and Technology at AGT.Seven, will address the migration of Digital Smart Factory concepts out of the prepress function and into manufacturing operations, the creative area, and print business management systems. Ray Hartman, Senior Vice President of R. R. Donnelley & Sons, will provide the keynote address. The 2004 R&E Council of NAPL Digital Smart Factory Forum will be chaired by Charles R. Gehman, Director of Product Marketing at EFI. In announcing the forum program, R&E Council managing director Ronald L. Mihills commented: “The automation technologies available to printers and publishers today can be overwhelming at times, and can baffle even those who have implemented complex MIS systems and are familiar with sophisticated prepress techniques. All too often, discussions of these technologies are conducted in the context of computer software code and still-to-be-announced possibilities. Only at the R&E Council of NAPL Digital Smart Factory Forum can printers, their customers, and their suppliers learn about industry automation in language they understand. The 2004 meeting, the sixth in an ongoing series, promises to be the best yet.” The R&E Council of NAPL Digital Smart Factory Forum will immediately follow the EFI Connect V Users Conference, and attendees are invited to attend the closing session of that meeting at no charge. Registration information for the 2004 Digital Smart Factory Forum is available at www.napl.org, or by calling the R&E Council at 804-436-9922.