Melinda Healy reports straight from the conference floor at the annual Panpa newspaper publishers talkfest, which this year took place in Queensland
The Pacific Area Newspaper Publishers’ Association (Panpa) Conference 2008 held on the Gold Coast earlier this month offered industry professionals new ideas, methodologies and approaches to improve the quality of journalism and the ability to print brighter more relevant newspapers, produce compelling digital content and embrace new management techniques for a successful future.Panpa chief executive Mark Hollands impressed upon the conference that the economic turbulence of the past 12 months had increased the importance of looking to the future with a sense of purpose and determined rejuvenation. What came out of the conference loud and clear is that Australia’s printing professionals like their publishing counterparts have a lot to look forward to. The opportunities and future development of the industry are further explored and explained in the following overview of the conference’s technology strand presentations.
State of Australian newspaper print technology
Bob Lockley – Chief Executive, Web Printing, Fairfax Media
Fairfax Media’s Bob Lockley has 24 years experience in the production of newspapers. He addressed the session and gave an overview on what’s been going on in Australia in the last 15 months, where opportunities lie for print and where those in the industry could exploit them.
Lockley highlighted the upgrades going on all over Australia within the major press groups. News Limited’s operation the Townsville Bulletin has had a 150-page press installed which should be up and running by July 2010, this is the biggest upgrade in Queensland.
There will also be an upgrade of the Myleene presses with an extra tower enabling 96 page back to back colour of each press. The Hobart Mercury has put a new press in which will be up and running in May 09 complete with Quadtech registration systems, while in Victoria Wangaratta and Yarrawonga have both had upgrades.
In New Zealand, additions have been made to the Waikato Times’ printing press, and there is a new line going into Christchurch. In Wellington Fairfax has put in a new Goss tower and the company will maintain its focus on NZ in the coming years. He said DIC had restructured its technical skills division which had led to rationalisation, and have undertaken a $1m upgrade and added a fourth tanker to their printing fleet. Meanwhile Muller Martini has put in its twentieth alphaline.
The APN press group has installed a new printing press at Yandina which was fully operational in 07; it runs coldset, hotset and has a Muller Martini finishing system. There are also upgrades ongoing at Bundaberg, Toowoomba, Ballina, and Rockhampton using Goss print sets. Mackay has also been upgraded with an 8-colour sheet fed machine.
Kodak has recently put in a no process plates system in place in Warrnambool in Victoria. The presses have 600DPI inkjet heads and Fuji in line with its two main rivals is spending huge amounts on on R+D.
Fairfax has closed down the Warrnambool press and moved the operation to Ballarat, they have moved the Wagga Wagga set-up to Albury and the Burnie press centre was closed down this year and the operation has been relocated to Launceston where two Goss towers have been added to the operation.
Polybagging is a process where the newspaper is automatically put into plastic bags ready for delivery, and has been introduced at Fairfax, at North Richmond, at the Canberra Times.
Lockley was clearly making the incontrovertible point that the investment in newspaper production technology by Australian newspaper publishers continues to be at very levels, and that investment is entirely reflective of their belief that newspapers will continue to be a major part of the domestic media landscape.
The future of printing plates
Koni Neuhofer (Agfa), Warren Hinder (Fuji) and Gary Hardman (Kodak)
The attention turned to plates, and the experts in the printing plate business are adamant – chemical free printing is the way of the future. Koni Neuhofer (Agfa), Warren Hinder (Fuji) and Gary Hardman (Kodak) spoke about the technical innovations in printing plate technology and what it means to printing companies Australia-wide.
The trio believe this new plate technology will eventually overtake the current technologies of violet CTP and high speed developer based thermal newspaper plate processes. Kodak’s Hardman said the most popular plate used in newspapers today is the two-layer photopolymer plate – violet or thermal. The biggest difference when it comes to chemical free is there is no need for developer or replenisher – which therefore should reduce the cost of printing to the company, as well as enhancing its environmental credentials.
The working principle of chemical free printing is that the prewash, rinse and gum processes are eliminated. In the traditional photopolymer process the plate process: preheat, prewash, development, rinse, gum and dry, whereas in the chemical free adaption the process is preheat, development, and dry.
A modification of the photopolymer process does take place – the clean-out unit is where the prewash, rinse and gumming takes place in the new technology. The benefits of separating the process into a dedicated unit are that the coating in the non image is removed here, not on the press.
The run length using a violet chemical free plate system is up to 200,000 provided the company is not using UV inks, and 160 single plates can be produced per hour.
Benefits to users of chemical free plates is that a clearer, higher contrast image is produced following the exposure and gumming process – one of the advantages of this is that visual inspection is possible before the plate is mounted on the press. Another is that the gumming protects the plate against scratching and oxidation, contamination is also limited.
Neuhofer from Agfa said switching to chemical free was relatively easy. Although this is a relatively new technology current users include printing companies in Austria, Germany and France. Neuhofer and his imaging counterparts believe violet technology is the industry’s security for the future.
Separation of print and publishing
Roland Thees - IFRA
Growing a print business in the current climate is not an easy task, but with the right focus and strategy it is possible. Roland Thees is an IFRA research manager, whose primary focus is on newspaper production technology and workflow. He presented his views at this year’s conference with regards to separating publishing and printing processes.
Up until now most publishing and printing has been conducted under the one roof – the journalist inputs the material and the press and online components of the business output it. According to Thees separation has become the hot topic as a result of the changing media market. It’s no secret newspaper companies have enlarged their product range and the number
of channels used to disseminate information.
He pointed out that it has only been in the last 15 years that data communication, remote access and standardisation has allowed the separation of printing and publishing to become a reality. Thees said separation would help newspaper companies produce better newspapers and maintain focus which will in turn increase profits.
There are options when it comes to doing this and specific strategies are required depending on the company’s circumstance. Joint venture, outsourcing, cost centre and profit centre strategies are the four that were discussed. The influences for the joint venture option include: keeping expertise and control, collaborative experience; for outsourcing they include: need of external expertise, re-focus on core business, availability of expert printers; for cost centre they include: internal expertise available, investment and debt capacity, no available expert printer to outsource to, and finally securing a return on investments.
Thees says that the question of which way to go is dependent on the specific situation of the printer and publisher, and the availability of partners. There is no one answer and whichever option is chosen there will always be challenges along the way.
He says, “Getting a clear view of opportunities and weaknesses is a challenge, and requires a change of mindset on the part of publishing management if separation is to succeed.”
His advice to newspaper publishers: “Concentrate on what you do best – publishing, and let someone else worry about printing, a specialist, it will make for a better product.”
Print technology future
Marcus Haefeli, managing director MAN Ferrostaal, Peter Kirwan, sales director Asia Pacific, Goss International
There is no doubt the future of printing and publishing is exciting and with the development of new technologies there is a lot to look forward to – at least that was the word from Marcus Haefeli when he presented on the future of print technology. Haefeli said the focus throughout the globe was on adding fun to newspapers and making print material more enticing to its readers.
Some applications that are doing this include fresh newspaper design, the introduction of transparent paper in advertising, the use of neon coloured inks, scented inks and creative folds to name just a few.
Haefeli says some new business models are targeting children’s loyalty – this is being achieved by producing youth-specific publications, that is aimed at developing ongoing readership and increasing subscriptions into the future.
Citizen journalism is another strategy that is being implemented by overseas publishers – this involves taking comments from the web on a particular topic and publishing them in the newspaper once a week on a dedicated page – again increasing readership and interest in the newspaper. Haefeli said there was a global trend toward smaller format publications and that can be seen already in Australia in the form of Marie Clare, and some UK publications like Gossip.
Peter Kirwan of Goss International also addressed the group and spoke of Goss’ advanced web offset printing press and print finishing systems for newspaper, commercial and insert printing industries. Kirwin highlighted the innovative specifications that newspaper publishers are requesting, in order to keep moving ahead.
Goss has installed a Universal 75 set up in Belgium complete with a 700mm cut-off. They have installed a combination Uniliner S in Sing Tao and a semi-commercial Uniliner press at Ukraine polygraphmedia as well as a Unipress in Portugal.
The Panpa conference once again proved a valuable learning tool for all industry professionals – it certainly exposed the fact that regardless of the area of specialisation everyone can learn from each other. In the words of Hollands, ‘the next battle for print and digital is here and it is here for us all to win’.
