Media Expo 2016, New Delhi records maximum exhibitors

Innovations give signage professionals a distinct business advantage Organised by Messe Frankfurt, Media Expo in its 29th edition, returned to New Delhi with a spectrum of innovative products and technologies from leading companies from India and overseas. JYANESWAR LAISHRAM and ABHINAV MALLIK report the three-day expo, held from September 29 – October 01, 2016 at Pragati Maidan, New Delhi. Across the show floor of 12,444 sq m in three halls, Media Expo 2016 in New Delhi brought an array of showcases revealing latest signage technologies and products with a cohesive approach to boost the business of PSPs, sign makers and others to a new echelon. More than 175 exhibitors, consisting of big machine manufacturers, channel partners and OEMs, participated in the landmark expo.

The new-age signage innovations were offered by exhibitors from India and offsore countries like UK, China, Japan, South Korea, Philippine and others brought to display. “The expo is positively growing year-on-year; this year, the exhibition floor has grown 30 percent from last year and 20 percent in number of exhibitors,” said Raj Mahek, executive director, Messe Frankfurt (HK) Ltd.

MAJOR SHOWCASES

At the expo, FUJIFILM India unveiled its ‘Made in India, Made for India’ eco-solvent printer—Vybrant 1800. “We had already announced the launch of the printer earlier at our demo centre in Mumbai; and this introduction is for the northern Indian market,” informed Yasunobu Nishiyama, MD, FUJIFILM India Pvt Ltd. He added that the printer is their indigenously born first eco-solvent baby in India and they are looking ahead to introducing upgraded models of the same technology. Also shown at the company’s stall was Acuity EY, equipped with the company’s award-winning Uvijet inks.

NEGI Sign Systems & Supplies pulled crowd with the introduction of its Negijet TX R-1900 direct textile printer and Negijet Starfire 3000 Series, alongside a line of its existing printers designed for varied range of applications.

With the introduction of the new RJ 1016V UV LED curing flatbed printer, Mehta Cad Cam Systems demonstrated its spectrum of machines, designed for different activities including CNC routing, laser engraving, etc. According to Shailesh Mehta, director, Mehta Cad Cam Systems Pvt Ltd, the newly introduced RJ 1016V is engineered to offer the best cost vs performance value in the market. Mono Sign Systems introduced UNO Series—an LED module with no requirement of ‘power supply’ as it runs on direct current consuming only 220V. Saurabh Agarwal of Mono Sign Systems explained that the new LED module would save cost, power and labour. A big crowd puller on the other side of the show floor, Sun Sign & Technologies announced its latest product SENFA Decoprint, a complete textile media range for almost all possible applications, which include backlit displays, interior walls, events, fine art reproduction and outdoor displays.

With the launch of UJF-3042 MkII UV-LED inkjet flatbed printer, Mimaki India displayed its range of machines, which included the TX300P-1800 direct-to textile printer for on-demand production. Tomohiro Ikeda, MD, Mimaki India Private Limited, said the newly introduced UV printer is for high-quality and highly accurate prints and he expressed his delight about the expo’s good footfall. Showcased attractively at the stall of Britomatics was a BriteJet 3000 Series with Konica E512i (32pl) printhead. Sumit Dev, director, Britomatics India Private Limited, revealed that more than 50 printers of the model have so far been installed countrywide.

Providing a complete portfolio of large-format and flatbed printers as well as materials, JN Arora showcased a long line of machines for diverse applications, comprising Coltex sublimation printer, HandTop flatbed inkjet systems, Siser’s digital thermo transfer textile media for both plotter cut and printable range, among many others. Vimlesh Arora, MD, JN Arora, said the company’s participation in the expo was a big opportunity for them to unfold a fresh spectrum of technologies and machineries triggering a new revolution in sign making. Crowd that thronged the company’s stall was impressed with the unique features of Coltex sublimation system and another crowd pulling Smartjet UV LED curing flatbed printer.

In the league of major show-stoppers at the expo was Roland DG, which along with its Indian channel partner Apsom Infotex presented a line of machines, among which TrueVIS VG-640/540 print-and-cut eco-solvent printer pulled the crowd. “We are showing here some new products that we premiered at drupa 2016; it’s good to see crowd swarming around our showcases,” told Deborshi Paul Choudhury from Apsom Infotex Ltd.

At an adjacent stall, Colorjet stormed the show-floor with the announcement of new printers, technologies and ‘an attractive scheme’ for those investing in the upgraded version of Neptune printer shown during the expo.

Caldron was another big showstopper as the company introduced a portfolio comprising CJ 8000 dual purpose roll-to-roll and flatbed printer, HS-M3015B plates and pipes fibre cutting machine, among others.

RICOH India, on the other side, introduced its RICOH Pro L4160 at the expo. About it, Anuj Gupta, regional business manager-North Production Printing Business Group, RICOH India Limited, said trade visitors showed ardent interest in the company’s new and versatile wide-format system.

Showing its ever popular cutting plotters, among which the new Graphtec CE6000 and FC8000 Series was the products of attraction at the expo, regular participant Keith Electronics attracted a host of serious trade visitors. “This show is always turned out to be a good platform to introduce our new range of high quality, highly reliable and easy-to-operate cutting plotters,” Raj Chopra, director, Keith Electronics Pvt Ltd.

With the announcement of its Mimaki dealership, Vee Kay Enterprise also unpacked two new quality printers—IDS-3300 UV roll-to-roll 3.2 m long printer and Ultra-Jet 512i high-speed solvent printer.

PRINTING SYSTEMS

Fresh at the expo from EPSON were three new SureColor 64-inch printers designed for high-quality graphic production. The newly unpacked printers from the company were EPSON S40670, S60670 and S80670, all equipped with PrecisionCore printheads. Yet another show-stopper at a nearby stall was Arrow Digital that physically demonstrated a line of high-end printers, including an EFI VUTEk GS 1625 LX Pro UV hybrid printer.

PICOMAX Pro with Konica Minolta 512i/512/1024 printheads was the new launch from Macart Equipments, a renowned manufacturer of wide-format machines in India.

Showing its line of solvent and eco-solvent printers, along with a bunch of spare parts, Daksh Enterprises offered an exclusive set of systems. While, Konica Minolta Business Solutions India marked an offbeat presence at the expo. In this respect, Manish Gupta, senior product marketing manager-PP, sales & marketing from the company, said a lot of wide-format printing firms are users of their digital presses—that’s why it made sense for them to take part in the signage expo.

CUTTING, BENDING & FINISHING

APL Machinery, a leading manufacturer of UV curing and coating systems, demonstrated its fully automated high-speed UV coating machine with precise registration, among other machines at the expo. “This machine can be used as offline coater for UV and aqueous coating as well as primer on a range of applications including posters,” explained Abhishek Paul, director, APL Machinery Pvt Ltd. In addition, the other machines on display at the company’s stall consisted of DIGI UV System, 3D UV curing system, Roller coating machine, among others.

STLT (Sahajanand Laser Technologies Ltd), among the big show stealers, demonstrated its huge Infinity Fibre metal cutting system. Benson Polymers showcased the company’s Polyfix, an instant glue cyanoacrylate adhesive solution and other products designed for fabrication of signage and display items.

LINE OF MEDIAS

Among the exhibitors displaying a versatile range of printing media or materials included Pioneer Polyleathers Limited, Qurex Flex, ITMS India, Sun Printable Fabrics, Dinesh Acrylic House, Sunlex Fabrics, and Aditya Impex.

INK RANGE

FUJIFILM Sericol India, a renowned ink major, showcased infinite solutions of its widely-acclaimed Color+ Series inks designed qualitatively for different wide-format technology printheads, namely, Dimatix Spectra, XAAR, Seiko, Konica Minolta, RICOH and Epson.

SAM-INK range from Inkjet Systems attracted visitors looking for quality inks. Another exhibitor introducing a range of solvent-based inks at their stall was Navratan Specialty Chemicals.

Among those showing premium range of inks at the expo was AT Inks, which presented high-end products comprising Quattro, Duos and Cobalt, suitably designed for varied printheads including StarFire.

CHINESE PAVILIONS

Presence of a band of Chinese exhibitors made the perfect diversity in the expo. The offshore exhibitors showed a gamut of products consisting predominantly of printing media and LED components. The overseas participants were collectively allocated in the strategically devoted ‘Chinese Pavilions’ stalls.

‘We are pushing latex into different markets’: Puneet Chadha

HP at its stall had shed some light on ‘latex’ technologies, about which Puneet Chadha, director-market development, Graphics Solutions Business, HP (PPS APJ), said that the technology has been successful for their customers for years. “Latex is so versatile in terms of printing on all substrates. So, our customers have done fantastic jobs using this technology,” he shared. At the expo, HP introduced HP Latex 500 Series, upgraded versions of HP Latex 300 Series for unattended printing, and HP Latex 1500 Series for high-volume production.

“Now, latex applications are visible in all parameters, be it in billboard, fleet graphics, transits and all high-volume jobs; we are seeing penetration of the technology into different markets,” asserted Puneet. Latex technology now covers a lot of innovations, including wall art (using HP Wall Art media), interior decors, fleet graphics and canvas prints, all churned on flatbed printing platform. “In order to make our customers grow hand-in-hand with us, we organise brand engagement seminars called ‘Innovations Win’ in major cities. Our customers through these seminars could show what they produce to reach out to brands. On this front, latex technology is very successful,” narrated Puneet. And on the other side at another stall of the company, HP also presented two new versatile Designjet post-script printers. New arrivals from Monotech Systems

Three brand new printers from Monotech Systems drew crowd at the expo. The three newly unpacked machines from the company were: Pixeljet UV LED RTR with RICOH printhead; Pixeljet Satrfire Series with Spectra printheads; and Pixeljet Jumbo Series with KM 512i printheads. In addition, the company showcased also other systems at its stall, such as Pixeljet ECO 1800TS with RICOH printheads, Canon iPF 8410SE system, among others.

Taking to Sign & Graphics, TP Jain, MD, Monotech Systems, said they would plan to bring up next big technologies for the wide-format market, particularly in the hybrid domain. “We have already penetrated into the flatbed domain and a lot of our machines are now running in several signage firms all over the country; now, our turn to focus on hybrid models, combining the technologies of roll-to-roll and flatbed,” he narrated. Fresh innovations from Monotech Systems would also be in the realm of double-sided flatbed printing compatible with new and better set of media for nigh-end graphic applications, including outputs for in-store displays.