Consumables-General - Plates

Demand for Kodak Sonora process-free plates is up, motivating Kodak to increase domestic production capacity.

Europe’s Unified Patent Court ordered Kodak to stop selling its Sonora XTRA-3 process-free printing plates in Germany, following a patent infringement lawsuit filed by Fujifilm

This year, Kodak celebrates 30 years of thermal plate imaging. First introduced at drupa in 1995, the technology transformed the CTP market.

With the year already more than half over, it’s a great time to pause and take stock of what’s going on in the consumables space.

DEHN, a family-owned electrical engineering company based in Neumarkt, Germany, has digitalized the imaging process in its in-plant with the installation of an XSYS ThermoFlexX 30 for the production of pad printing plates.

The speed of the high-performance KODAK MAGNUS Q800 platesetter has been increased once again with T-speed Plus. It boasts the fastest 8-page imaging available, up to 84 plates per hour, plus several automation options.

Agfa will increase its offset plate prices worldwide, effective July 1, 2022. Since Q2 last year, Agfa has been implementing quarterly price increases and surcharges to compensate for the significant cost increases it has been facing in raw materials, logistics, energy, packaging material and labor.

Soaring input costs, particularly relevant to aluminum, energy, and packaging materials, in combination with sharply rising freight rates due to global logistic constraints make price increases unavoidable. Prices of offset plates will increase between 5% and 10%, taking effect April 1.

The new Offset Technical Competence Center features commercial, packaging, newspaper, UV printing applications that also offer sustainable benefits. The facility showcases applications to reduce waste, eliminate chemicals, and lower ink consumption while saving energy.

Agfa Graphics has announced that it will be closing its 250,000-sq.-ft. offset printing plate manufacturing facility in Branchburg, N.J., by the end of this year in order to optimize its global production capacity and supply chain efficiencies. The plant closure will impact 125 workers.