Packaging Friendly Press's Technology Award

KBA has won the Printing Industries of America and Graphic Arts Technical Foundation Intertech Technology Award for its Rapida 205 superlarge sheetfed press.

KBA has won the Printing Industries of America and Graphic Arts Technical Foundation Intertech Technology Award for its Rapida 205 superlarge sheetfed press.

The company was one of 13 award winners out of a field of 52 entrants.

In determining the award, PIA and GATF judges said: "The Rapida 205's high print quality and low make-ready times take sheetfed press technology to an acme of productivity in a sheet size that has never been printed before.

Printers can replace two to four older presses with just one high-tech Rapida 205.

The technology, an engineering benchmark, is packaging friendly and it gives users a way to go after the large-format market." KBA has sold 40 Rapida 205 presses to date, nine of them to US companies.

Ten or more have already come on stream in various configurations, from conventional four-colour or five-colour presses to six-colour UV versions, with coaters and dryers and three of those are in the USA.

As one user commented: "The press has differentiated us from our competitors by showcasing how we can handle this press's unique extra large-format abilities and provide customers with products they didn't know they could afford." Alongside packaging, the Rapida 205 can be fitted with a slitter and perforator.

It can handle lightweight paper, board and even plastic and corrugated substrates.

A range of automated technology (plate changers, blanket and impression cylinder washing systems, as well as autoregister, for instance) make it as easy to operate as a medium-format press claimed KBA.

Ralf Sammeck, the president and chief executive officer of KBA North America, said: "We are deeply honoured and thrilled to be the recipient of the PIA and GATF Intertech Technology award for 2005.

It is particularly gratifying because it shows that KBA is committed to focusing on our customers' needs and helping them move in to new markets." PIA and GATF is the world's largest graphic arts trade association, representing an industry with more than 1.2 million employees.

It serves the interests of more than 12,000 member companies.

Inaugurated in 1978 to foster awareness and understanding of advanced graphic arts technology, PIA and GATF's Intertech Award honours excellence in innovative technology for the printing industry.

Recipients are chosen by an independent, anonymous panel of judges, all distinguished within the industry.

The nomination criteria stipulate that the technology be recently developed but out of beta and be proven in industrial application, whilst not yet in widespread use.

It must also be expected to have a major impact on the graphic communications industry over the next five years.

It is claimed that 80 per cent of past recipients of the awards have gone on to commercial success in the marketplace.

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