The venue might have been a fun park but Ricoh will find few joyrides in its efforts to seize a decent share of the tough digital print market in Australia and New Zealand during the current downturn. Nevertheless, the company is obviously very confident that this machine, alongside its recently-strengthened digital production team, can make significant inroads into the local markets. Ricoh predicts that the production printing market will grow to $A20 billion by 2013.
Speaking to the gathering at Luna Park, the division's general manager Kathy Wilson (pictured) pointed out that Ricoh had recognised a digital print segment, positioned between very heavy production and light production, that was not adequately catered to with appropriate technology. This is where the company sees the Pro C900 fitting in.
Photo gallery: pictures from Ricoh's C900 series launch at Luna Park.
Wilson highlighted several key factors that will drive growth in the digital print sector. Client demands, such as shorter runs, better-targeted marketing collateral, and curbs on wastage during production and after the life of the marketing campaign will push digital print's market share higher in coming years. This will be augmented by the value of variable data print to marketers, and cross-media opportunities with PURLs and direct markeitng.
The separation, or "displacement", between offset and digital printing is no longer a conversation, as many print businesses integrate both technologies in their operations using hybrid workflows.
The Ricoh Pro C900 is a high-volume, full-colour production press with a range of automated finishing options, including what Ricoh claims is the first fully automated ring binding solution.
Among its main features are a print speed of 90ppm in both colour and black-and-white for all stocks up to 300gsm (heavier stocks don't slow the machine's speed during production), paper capacity of up to 11,000 pages, the ability to replace toner while running the machine, an SRA3 large capacity tray with Air-Assist Paper Feed for feeding coated paper, and up to seven trays.
Ricoh claims real 1,200dpi resolution for high quality print, a standard built-in EFI print server which brings minimal operator intervention with Fiery solutions, and optional Fiery Graphic Arts Package Premium, automatic balancing of different colour management systems, optimum accuracy with ICC profiles, even from RGB applications, full variable data printing support, pre-flight and an image viewer.
Among the finishing features are fully automated ring binding, with a binding capacity up to 50 or 100 pages on A4 booklet sizes. The perfect binder option produces books with up to 200 sheets, cover page insertion as standard and paper support up to 300gsm. Three/one edge automatic trimming comes standard for book sizes of A4 and A5.