RoyleBind scoops American trade award for top-secret printing process

Homegrown binding specialist RoyleBind has made its mark Stateside with a top-secret digital process that won first place in Printing Industries of America awards.

RoyleBind won the category for 'four-colour process digital onto paper' at the Product of Excellence awards, staged by the Binding Industries Association in conjunction with the leading US trade body.

Founder Cliff Royle told ProPrint he clinched the award thanks to a patent-pending process that allowed him to digitally print on top of lamination.

"Normally you print onto paper and laminate afterwards. You can print digitally over the top, but you would have raised print on the surface and trouble with scuffing."

He said that by combining his process with a specific type of cellosheen, the print was absorbed into the laminate and went right through to the board.

"You'd swear blind it was laminated afterwards," he added. "People from the trade in the US and here are blown away.

"I can also make them at an astonishing speed. Normal hardcovers are made at 3,000 an hour. I can manufacture them at up to 25,000 an hour if required," said Royle.

The win has boosted the Victorian company's US profile, with Royle saying he had seen strong interest from numerous US corporations in his newest binding technology.

RoyleBind has just launched "the world's first patented hard cover self-locking system", which requires no binding equipment.

Royle called the manufacturing method "a quantum leap in production and quality" and said the new self-locking technology would be ideal for photobook production.

"People don't want wiro when it comes to photobooks. The self-locking system could have a huge impact on the photobook industry," said Royle.

He said that he was aiming the product at the retail market and was in discussion with big retail brands in Australia and the US.

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