The first-ever worldwide virtual users’ conference for Electronics For Imaging, Inc. customers, EFI Engage, features groundbreaking new innovations that accelerate customers’ ability to profitably and efficiently transition from analogue to digital printing.
The Jan. 25-Feb. 5 event features a virtual exhibition hall, along with demos and presentations on advanced Productivity Suite MIS/ERP, inkjet printing, and Fiery digital front end (DFE) solutions. Advanced superwide-format inkjet technologies at Engage include a new, higher-throughput VUTEk XT hybrid device – one of multiple superwide-format display graphics production solutions launching at the event.
In addition to workshops, presentations, seminars and discussions on commercial printing, packaging and inkjet display graphics applications, EFI Engage will be the first global EFI users conference to feature a full training track on industrial textile printing, with training and demos on the full portfolio of EFI Reggiani digital production solutions for apparel and textile manufacturing.
The event features comprehensive training for corrugated and other package converting applications, as well as introductory sessions detailing important opportunities in the building materials market, including EFI Cretaprint tile decoration solutions along with high-quality industrial digital production applications using EFI Cubik single-pass printers for digital wood staining and decoration.
“EFI Engage features a wealth of content and information to help customers learn about important new opportunities, as well as gain actionable ideas that can propel them into a more efficient and profitable ‘next normal’ phase of business,” said EFI Chairman and CEO Jeff Jacobson. “Attendees will learn about the strengths they can create in the future with leading-edge workflow innovation, along with the important expansion in print’s analogue-to-digital evolution that comes with our newest, most-advanced inkjet solutions.”
Superior digital print across markets with EFI’s leading portfolio
New solutions premiering during Engage include:
• The new version 9 releases in EFI’s Productivity Suite offerings, which provide comprehensive, validated, end-to-end business and production management workflows for commercial print, mailing, display graphics, publication and packaging operations – based on EFI’s industry-leading MIS/ERP platforms, including Monarch, Pace, Radius, CTI and Technique software.
• EFI’s new super-high-speed VUTEk XT hybrid printer – a breakthrough solution designed to drive a significant reduction in total cost of ownership with superior throughput exceeding 375 boards per hour, innovative ink delivery, and the power of EFI’s integrated workflow. New CP5G ink delivery technology on the printer delivers complete ink circulation, superior dot placement, 5-picolitre drops and greyscale imaging – a robust feature set provides fine text imaging and near-lithographic imaging with a four-colour CMYK ink sets.
• A second super-high-speed product, a Single-Pass for Display Graphics printer optimised for high-volume production on signage media at speeds up to 1,000 sheets per hour.
• EFI’s fastest roll-to-roll superwide-format printers – new 350- and 520-centimetre wide EFI VUTEk Q3r and Q5r UV LED printers that deliver expanded capabilities for a wide range of challenging, high-volume applications, with premium features such as multi-layer white and high-value in-line finishing, collection and auto backlit and blockout options that help users achieve a remarkably low total cost of operation.
• The newest release of EFI’s Fiery Command WorkStation management interface, version 6.6, which delivers the company’s most-robust search interface capabilities and powers faster curve and spot-colour editing capabilities, along with access to a host of additional features, such as the EFI IQ suite of cloud-based applications to help printing businesses extract value from data to minimise bottlenecks, optimise equipment utilisation and achieve higher print quality.
• The latest version of Fiery JobFlow, a prepress production automation solution that now gives users the power to significantly upscale images with excellent output quality, reorganise PDF pages to make long jobs more manageable, and collect jobs based on time to ensure meeting production deadlines.
Through more than 200 online conference sessions, EFI Engage highlights the expanded possibilities print and packaging businesses can achieve with leaner, faster, more-efficient and more-integrated print production. The new EFI Fiery Command WorkStation offering – the free, market-leading, central interface used to direct hundreds of thousands of Fiery Driven™ digital print devices around the world – helps users manage their digital print operations better, even across multiple printers and locations, and produce higher quality print with fewer mistakes.
Industry-leading digital print capabilities to drive opportunity
One early Fiery Command WorkStation 6.6 user, Tom Griffiths, CEO of Slough, England-based design and print agency Page Visions, drives more efficient work when creating and managing jobs – especially through the ability to create and save very specific searches.
“The latest features delivered in Fiery Command WorkStation make it more than just a pre-press and press operators’ tool,” said Griffiths. “The new Advanced Search with version 6.6 means we are able to get very granular with our job filtering and combine parameters to create production efficiencies. Plus, the fact that Fiery Command WorkStation’s stability is rock solid is also massive for us.”
Another key innovation launching during Engage, the newest version of EFI Fiery JobFlow software, breaks down the barriers to print automation. With the software, users can efficiently scale images for wide and super-wide format applications. A pages module in the software enables operators to easily manage long jobs by splitting up a PDF using a set number of pages, PDF bookmarks, or page ranges. Users can also define job route behaviour in using JobFlow to get jobs printed as fast as possible when a Fiery server is unavailable.
An important production innovation launching during Engage for cut-sheet digital printing – the integration between EFI Fiery Impose software and Duplo DC-618 Slitter/Cutter/Creaser devices – automates job preparation and finisher setup for higher-value custom jobs. The integration cuts the initial setup time of the workflow in half and saves users up to 70% in setup time preparing printing jobs with seamless, automated, two-way communication.
In addition to the latest EFI workflow, Fiery DFE and inkjet display graphics offerings featured in EFI Engage’s exhibit area, this year’s conference also features advanced solutions from participating partners, including 3M Commercial Solutions; Aberdeen Fabrics; Duplo; ISCorp; Lubrizol, Progress Software Corp.; Ricoh; and Thomson Reuters.
