IVE Purchases LITHOMAN 80-Page Press

After expanding into large Format Web Offset Catalogue Printing sector by acquiring Franklin Web and AIW Printing, the IVE Group further expands with a LITHOMAN 80-page press, which is customized for high-volume commercial printing.

manroland Goss web systems, the leading manufacturer of web offset printing equipment, is announcing the sale of a 4 unit LITHOMAN 80-page press for IVE Group to print catalogues. With the new investment, the IVE Group keeps the course of using the latest technology and therefore chose the market leading printing press from manroland Goss web systems.

LITHOMAN: high-volume meets high-quality. The LITHOMAN is the worldwide leader at the high-quality, high-volume segment. With its state-of-the-art drive and folding technology and ground breaking automation features, over 400 LITHOMAN systems are at work today, printing magazines, catalogues, directories, and advertising supplements. From 32 to 96 pages, in short or long grain: the LITHOMAN’s productivity helps to establish web offset printing even among a growing group of gravure printers.

The 80-page high-volume press with 4 printing units has a web width of 2060 mm and a maximum production speed of 50.000 Cyl.rev/h It will mainly produce catalogues The LITHOMAN will be equipped with several automation features such as automatic plate loading (APL), an automatic reel handling system and several Inline Control Systems to reduce waste and costs while increasing the printing quality.

Meeting market requirements “We are very happy about the further decision for a manroland Goss web systems press in Australia, which is a great market for us. Especially at the high-volume commercial sector we see a great development for the next years. With their decision for our LITHOMAN 80-page press, IVE will be perfectly equipped for the new market requirements”, Tim Ruth, Executive Vice President Sales at manroland Goss web systems states. “The LITHOMAN definitely turned out to be the best-in-class press for our demands. We will be able to produce high-volume catalogues runs with lower cost-per-copy and waste rates while at the same time increasing the printing quality”, Warwick Hay, Managing Director from IVE explains the investment decision.

Franklin Web, Member of IVE Group. Franklin Web, which is already producing on two manroland Goss web systems LITHOMAN presses of the same kind, has been acquired by the IVE Group in December 2016. The acquisition consolidates IVE’s position as Australia’s leading vertically integrated marketing and print communications company. The move into large format web offset catalogue production has been a logical and attractive extension for IVE as it continues to broaden its product and service offering, further enhancing its already powerful value proposition to the retail sector. IVE Group has evolved from a family owned print production business in the early 1920’s to Australia’s most diversified print and marketing communications business, with annual revenues in excess of $370 million and over 1,300 employees. The Australian company creates, designs, produces and manages tailored solutions across all channels. The IVE Group has just recently invested for their Blue Star WEB Division for a highly automated direct drive ROTOMAN 16-page commercial press from manroland Goss web systems which will be installed in their Silverwater Plant in New South Wales.