The Deal of the Year, One Year Later

When two of the most well-known brands in the printing world joined forces a little over a year ago, it was heralded as “The Deal of the Year” for both companies. When Heidelberg acquired Gallus, it received a major inroad into the packaging segment, while Gallus has seen its resources expand substantially with the backing of Heidelberg, a giant in the industry.

At the time of the acquisition, there were rumblings of a new digital solution on the horizon that would implement strengths from both Gallus and Heidelberg and utilize technology from Fujifilm. The rumblings have since come to fruition with the highly anticipated release of the Gallus DCS 340, a digital label printing press with integrated flexo capabilities, occurring at Labelexpo Europe earlier this month.

And while this exciting piece of equipment will certainly shake up the digital printing and label printing worlds, there is much more on the horizon for Gallus and Heidelberg as they continue to operate side by side.

Benefits on Both Ends

When Gallus became a Heidelberg company, it was unclear whether Gallus would be retaining its name and brand image. But Gallus CEO Klaus Bachstein says that keeping the Gallus name on the market is important to the company and is also beneficial to Heidelberg.

Bachstein states that since the beginning of the relationship, Heidelberg’s interest in Gallus has been in developing a pathway into the label market. Since Gallus already carried positive name recognition in that segment, Bachstein explains that it would make the most sense to maintain the brand name.

“Even though we are now 100 percent a Heidelberg company, we will maintain our brand and continue to brand under Gallus since Gallus is quite a well-known brand in the label business,” Bachstein says. “Heidelberg’s strategic interest in Gallus always was to get an inroad into the label market.”

Prior to the acquisition, Bachstein says that Gallus was operating as a medium-sized company. But by becoming part of the Heidelberg portfolio, it provided immediate access to the massive amount of resources that a major company like Heidelberg can offer.

The immediate aftermath of receiving these resources and knowledge from Heidelberg, Bachstein explains, is the release of the Gallus DCS 340.

“I consider it a nice achievement because with a combined project team of engineers from Heidelberg and Gallus working on this project completely focused, we were able to bring that product in record development time compared to earlier developments,” he says.

Gallus Goes Digital

Though the press is being branded as the Gallus DCS 340, the new digital solution was a joint effort from both companies. But as Bachstein explains, Gallus needed to kickstart the development of the project with its expansive knowledge of the packaging industry, particularly in regard to labels.

The Gallus DCS 340, which integrates digital and flexo technology, was officially released at Labelexpo 2015.

“We had to bring all of the application know-how from a customer’s point of view into the project,” Bachstein says. “What is important for a label printer? What does he or she actually need?”

The answers were print quality, which on the Gallus DCS 340, Bachstein says is near-offset; speed that compares favorably to other digital solutions on the market; and in-line converting capabilties including semi-rotary diecutting and varnishing.

However, what truly separates the Gallus DCS 340 from its competition is its integration of digital and flexo technologies. Michael Ring, Gallus’s vice president of worldwide sales and marketing digital solutions, explains that the versatility the multiple technologies on the Gallus DCS 340 will provide to label printers is something that has not been seen before on the market.

“This isn’t just digital technology sitting on a flexo platform,” Ring says. “It’s truly integrated. In terms of digital capabilities, I think we’re going to be showing something that the marketplace has not seen before and has capabilities that have not been seen before.”

Ring says that flexo stations being placed in front of and behind the digital unit will allow printers to embrace their creativity when producing labels. For example, he says with this press, a converter could implement cold foiling and then digitally print directly on top of it.

“What’s exciting about this is you now enable a whole new host of application capabilities for designers to come up with,” Ring says. “You can throw the ball back into their court and say, ‘push this technology to its newest level.’”

While Gallus and Heidelberg are the companies with their names on the press, Fujifilm also became an important partner in the project. By providing the latest generation of Fuji Samba inkjet heads, which print at 1,200 dpi, Bachstein says the team’s goal of providing high-quality print was realized.

“We are down to droplets of two picoliters,” he states. “That means you are able to achieve a very fine dot. In printing it is always the same. You try to transfer the ink to paper in drops or points. The smaller the point or the drop is, the more you’re able to improve the quality.”

Available Abroad, On its Way Stateside

Though the Gallus DCS 340 had been unveiled previously at Gallus Innovation Days held at the company’s headquarters in St. Gallen, Switzerland, the big launch took place at Labelexpo 2015 in Brussels. With the press now available in Europe, Bachstein says that it won’t take much longer for it to be available to customers in North America. He gives a prediction of the first half of 2016 for the Gallus DCS 340 to make its North American debut, and says expectations and excitement within the company are big.

Ring says that there are customers in North America who have already made commitments to the press, despite it not having been released yet to that market. With significant demand for the press already, Ring says Gallus has plans to demonstrate the Gallus DCS 340 in North America and make print quality samples available through the company’s sales department.

“We absolutely plan on having demo capabilities in North America,” Ring says. “We feel it’s a requirement, like with all our new technology. Right now as we’re launching it, not only is it exciting, but there’s a tremendous amount of demand for the product, so we’re just trying to meet demand for our customers.”

And while digital innovation is certainly an exciting project within the Gallus and Heidelberg framework, Bachstein says new developments on the conventional printing side are in the works as well.

“Now we have digital, but at the same time, the world is not only digital,” he says. “Gallus is continuing to invest in analog and conventional presses and the process of continued improvement and a couple bigger steps are ahead of us.”

Heidelberg Rebrands and Reloads

New equipment is not the only exciting development happening with Heidelberg and Gallus. Over the summer, Heidelberg announced a series of strategic redevelopments, partnerships and rebranding efforts.

Many people in the industry have likely noticed the colorful tweak the company put on its iconic “H” logo, implementing three additional colors. According to the company, each color has a meaning, representative to one of the company’s figurative pillars. Yellow represents services, blue is symbolic of equipment and green symbolizes consumables.

While the company’s visual identity has changed, physical changes also took place this summer at Heidelberg’s location in Wiesloch-Walldorf. Heidelberg’s new Print Media Center Commercial joined the Print Media Center Packaging to become the largest demonstration facility for commercial printing and packaging worldwide.

Heidelberg also partnered with Masterwork Machinery, a Chinese manufacturer of finishing products, in package printing postpress. Through the partnership, Heidelberg has sold the Promatrix 106 CS and Easymatrix 106 CS diecutters in Europe.

“By using MK products, we can meet the specific demands of our customers in the packaging market,” explains Harald Weimer, member of the Heidelberg Management Board responsible for global sales. “They need the best machines for their individual requirements so as to ensure efficient and cost-effective folding carton production. We offer customers what they need, whether from Heidelberg or a partner. In MK, we’ve found a partner that has impressed us with the quality of its production and innovative research and development. It is a partnership that more than meets our high expectations.”