St Albans - A complete digital cutting solution from Zünd Plotting Systems (UK) Ltd has been installed at Reproflex 3 for the finishing of polymer printing plates, enabling the company to bring the process in-house.

Reproflex 3 is the first company in the UK to purchase a Zünd G3 digital cutting table for this application in the packaging market. Until its installation, the company was hand-cutting or outsourcing die-cutting work on a flat-bed machine. 

With three sites in Cramlington, near Newcastle upon Tyne, plus a facility in Dubai, Reproflex 3 manages the transition of new packaging designs to finished, printed products, in particular flexible packaging. Its client list is primarily blue chip brands and design agencies and includes Unilever, Procter and Gamble, Coca-Cola and Müller and supplies over 20,000 sqm of polymer each year. 

To manage this sizeable output, Reproflex 3 researched options for a digital cutting system that would hit the ground running and last well into the future. Having seen the Zünd G3 at printing industry show Drupa and compared it with its competitors, the company installed the solution late last year. 

"We tested the competition and found that the Zünd's workflow technology was by far the easier to use," explains Andrew Hewitson, Managing Director of Reproflex 3. "It has an open platform meaning our existing systems are able to drive it – the workflow is seamless. 

"Zünd has an amazing reputation and we've found that the quality of our polymer plates has improved for sure. We have more options for our packaging, with specific sizes now possible to make superior end products. It all just makes sense."

Reproflex 3 also has a department for carton designs, with the Zünd G3 being put to use creating mock-ups of finished designs in cut carton, board and corrugated materials before full production.

The Zünd G3 is an advanced, highly automated cutting table with modular tool and material-handling systems to enable exceptional output for a wide range of applications, across the packaging market and beyond. It has been designed by experts at Zünd's Swiss development facility to meet the needs of each unique user, with an extensive set of complementary tools and modules available to ensure the perfect configuration both upon installation and as requirements change in the future – with a robust build to withstand updates and 24-7 production.

"We work with many companies across the packaging market but Reproflex 3 is the first in the UK to use our equipment in the finishing of polymer plates, further proving its versatility," says Peter Giddings, Sales Director, Zünd Plotting Systems (UK) Ltd.