Memjet’s inkjet technology powers retrofit solutions, bringing new life to legacy printing presses 

San Diego, California – Memjet announces today that its patented inkjet technology is being used in retrofit printing solutions that have been developed by the company’s OEM partners like Colordyne Technologies. These retrofit solutions enable label printers to leverage their existing flexo press to capture the advantages of inkjet printing and produce high-quality, short run jobs that meet the demands of their clients. 

Bill Brunone, general manager, production press division at Memjet, notes, “Digital printing holds great promise for today’s label printers. But adopting a digital press is an expensive proposition, one that requires the printer to transform their operations. That’s why more and more narrow web printers are turning to retrofit solutions. These solutions allow the printer to upgrade their analog production press with a color inkjet module, giving them the best of both worlds: a way to take advantage of the opportunities color inkjet printing offers, without the obstacles that can come with purchasing a stand-alone digital press.”

The Retrofit Solution

A retrofit is a digital print module that gets integrated onto a third party piece of printing equipment or converting platform. For example, Memjet partner Colordyne has developed the 3600 Series Retrofit digital printing platform. This print production solution gives label converters a way to add full color digital inkjet printing to their flexographic press, while making use of their existing tooling inventory. 

With its quick set up and fast job change capability, a retrofit powered by Memjet technology enables faster job production at a low equipment cost. Moreover, the printer has more capacity to produce profitable long-run flexo work, while short run work can be produced digitally to generate more profit.

Speed and Quality

Prairie State Group is a full service printer of packaging materials. Their pressure sensitive labeling division produces labels for customers in a range of industries, with a specific focus on food labeling.

The Prairie State Group integrated a Colordyne 3600 retrofit digital printing platform to their eight-color Mark Andy 2200 as a way to move into digital printing at a lower cost of entry than buying a standalone digital press.

After using the press for nearly a year, the Prairie State Group is impressed with the way the solution easily integrates into their operation, and with the quality of the labels it produces. 

As Dan Doherty, executive vice president of operations and principal at Prairie State Group notes, “Retrofitting our Mark Andy press with a Colordyne 3600 made it easy for us to integrate digital into our operation. We didn’t have to buy offline finishing equipment or put the press in an environmentally controlled environment. These were key benefits for our operation.”

In addition, he was impressed with the results the retrofit press could produce. “The speed is impressive and the color gamut is superior to other four-color options we had seen. The retrofit can also produce labels with the same look and feel as flexo.”