Konica Minolta Exhibits an Array of New Products at drupa2008

Tokyo (May 28, 2008) –Konica Minolta Group will showcase an array of state-of-the-art products at drupa2008 – the world's largest printing media trade show held in Dusseldorf, Germany from May 29 to June 11.

Since 1951, drupa has been held every four years and this year marks 14th exhibition. More than 390,000 visitors from around the world attended the previous drupa in 2004. This year, the exhibition space will be expanded to over 170,000 square meters and exhibitors are surpassing 1800. This is, of course, the biggest ever in its history.

In the field of printing media, hybridizing offset printing and digital equipment in workflow is gradually getting popular. For this change in workflow, specialized knowledge is called for in each process from prepress to press and all through to postpress. With the penetration of diversified printing equipment featuring high quality and high productivity, a new market such as one-to-one market adopting transaction mail promotion (TransPromo) method is emerging.

For such an evolving printing media industry, Konica Minolta Group has been demonstrating the newest equipment and workflow at the trade shows held worldwide, and presenting unique solutions nurtured through its years of experience in the industry.

At drupa2008, three companies from Konica Minolta Group will be showcasing new products and state-of-the-art workflow solutions perfectly matching the market trend and business needs. Not only that, examples of improving operational efficiency and productivity, and new approach to add values will be shown at the booth.

Konica Minolta Group, with a view to always be ‘essential' in printing media field, will continue to offer unique solutions to meet the needs of diversifying market demand and expectations.

To meet the needs of all the visitors expecting to improve productivity, quality and efficiency, we have posted ‘scale up' as our motto for this year's exhibition.

For medium production print market, high performance monochrome bizhub PRO 2500P will be unveiled. This latest model uses single-pass technology to print both face and reverse side simultaneously to offer high productivity and high quality at the world's fastest speed of 250 images per minute (A4, 2-sided).

Also premiered at the booth are high-speed color machine with 65 sheets per minute, bizhub PRO C6501, and high-speed monochrome machine with 105 sheets per minute, bizhub PRO 1050e. These machines ensure high quality, high reliability, and high durability, and offer value-added diversified in-line printing and optimal workflow.

One of the workflow management software to be demonstrated will be PrintGroove POD Suite to control total printing process. Moreover, newly developed cutting-edge polymerized toner suitable for graphic art field will be disclosed as reference exhibit. Rich in color saturation, it reproduces color closer to sRGB color gamut.

Under the concept of 'Professionalism,' a wide range of prepress-related applications will be showcased at the booth. In the field of high quality and high-speed digital color printing system, LD-6501, compatible with PDF1.7 and incorporating professional RIP PR-6500, will be demonstrated. Konica Minolta's specialized workflow solutions, Imagehandler Pro and Pageintegrator Pro will also be demonstrated. Imagehandler Pro enables superb color management and RGB image correction. Pageintegrator Pro supports variable printing essential for today's one-to-one business. Another eye-catching exhibition is, high quality and high-speed digital color proofing system, Digital Konsensus Premium. It is perfect digital proofing solution for CTP workflow.

One of the notable premier demonstrations is inkjet printing using full-color single-pass technology incorporating newly developed inkjet printhead. A new product to make debut at the booth is high resolution and compact design monochrome inkjet print unit, SP-M0320HR. Inkjet printing using full-color serial scanning technology with KM printhead will also be demonstrated for the first time. In addition, Konica Minolta will display an array of piezo on-demand inkjet printheads for industrial use featuring high productivity and high reliability and compatible with wide range of inks including solvent, UV and oil inks. Together with printheads, Konica Minolta will showcase inkjet inks featuring brilliant color, faithful color reproduction, durability, as well as such environmental consideration as safety and lower odor emission.

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