SPGPrints has strengthened its commitment to the adoption and development of digital textile printing technology, with the formal opening of the Experience Center – the 700 m2 demonstration and training facility located at the company’s Boxmeer (Netherlands) headquarters.
More than 160 people, including employees from across the organisation, attended the ceremony, as the Mayor of Boxmeer, Karel van Soest, cut the ribbon to officially declare the Center open for business.
The facility contains SPGPrints’ two flagship digital textile printers in precisely maintained atmospheric conditions: an 1850mm-wide single-pass PIKE printer, designed for both large and short volumes with production speeds of up to 40m/min; and a 3200mm-wide multi-pass JAVELIN printer, for home furnishing applications. The Center also features a meeting room and state-of-the-art presentation equipment.
After the ceremony, attendees observed live demonstrations, showing the machines’ capabilities for delivering fine detail, while handling a variety of challenging geometric designs and achieving constant precise colour targets with wide gamuts, in addition to immediate job changes.
The Experience Center gives suppliers and buyers of digitally printed textiles a showcase for learning how to reap the revolutionary benefits of digital printing, and understanding the end-to-end implications of digital production with SPGPrints’ technology. The innovation hub will also give textile printers the ability to trial new designs and fabrics under test conditions and expert guidance.
Furthermore, the Center will allow SPGPrints’ own research and development staff to test and optimise proprietary PIKE and JAVELIN inks as new fabrics are introduced, enabling colour-matching and performance trials to be accelerated.
For customers, the Center will make it easier to implement digital workflows quickly and smoothly, and bring new ideas and products to the market faster, without the need to compromise output at their own facilities.
SPGPrints has been committed to textile printing innovation throughout the company’s 70-year history, firstly through the rotary screen technology that made high-quality mass-production possible, and, since 1986, through inkjet machine systems and proprietary inks developed under the same roof.
Dick Joustra, CEO, SPGPrints, comments: “Digital printing undoubtedly represents the future for textile printing. It is transforming the supply chain, making a wider variety of designs possible, shortening delivery times, delivering major cost savings and eliminating waste. At SPGPrints, we have been empowering the industry to exploit these benefits, through over three decades of digital inkjet innovation, culminating in the Archer technology deployed on the PIKE and JAVELIN printers.
The CEO adds: “The opening of the Experience Center marks our commitment to driving the adoption of the digital workflow. Not only will this provide the opportunity for brand-owners and printers to gain a first-hand, real-time insight into this technology’s tremendous potential; it will provide a dedicated space for further innovation in quality, productivity and sustainability, complementing our resources for the continued development of traditional rotary screen technologies.”
The new Experience Center is part of an €8 million capital investment programme by SPGPrints, covering an expansion area of 3000 m2. This also includes the building of the expanded Digital Inks Factory for production of its inkjet inks, enabling the company to boost capacity in response to the growth of the digital textile printing sector.