Back in 2012, Landa Digital Printing (LDP) made headlines when it showed its Nanographic printing systems at drupa. These were high-tech digital presses, loaded with advanced touchscreens and a new Nanoink.

It took quite a few years, but Landa Digital has run through its beta tests, and now has 12 presses in production worldwide. Benny Landa, chairman of Landa Digital Printing, made his name with his Indigo printing system, which he sold to HP, and he sees his Nanographic presses as being the future of printing.

“Printing will never be the same again,” Landa said during his virtual press briefing on September 16.

Joined by Landa Digital CEO Arik Gordon and business planner Nick Clements, Landa participated in a panel discussion on September 17 to bring the industry up-to-date on the state of the Landa presses. Presently, there are 12 Landa presses running worldwide, and LDP has three plants producing presses and inks.

“We have three plants in all: two systems plants and one consumables plant,” Landa said during a virtual tour of his facilities. “Today we have installations in Asia, in North America, in Central America and in Europe. In our two systems plants, we have a total of approximately 15 bays, designated for the manufacturing of the machines.”

“We are working here in full capacity, five days a week, two shifts a day,” Naama Konor-Gal, systems plant manager, added.

Aside from the S10 and S10P folding carton presses, Landa spoke about the W10 flexible packaging press.

“We have announced the W10 press but  haven’t started shipping yet,” he reported. “They are producing spectacular results. There is a very clear market need for digital packaging. It is one of the most demanding, requiring high quality and print on a huge range of materials, including films, metal foils and cartons and of course, digital white is a must. It has been a huge job incorporating all of these capabilities. We expect to have our first beta W10 site in 2021.”

Landa also spoke about the consumable plant, where Nanoink is being produced.

“What’s special about the plant is not just the degree of automation and the sophistication of the technology, but of course the ink itself, because it is the Nano pigment ink responsible for so many of the benefits of Nanography, such as the huge broad color gamut we have, the total absence of scatter from the images, the thinness of the images, and the ability to bond onto a huge range of substrates without any kind of primer or pretreatment,” Landa observed.

Landa and COVID-19
Landa and Gordon said that COVID-19 had a major impact on LDP, but the company is rebounding well.

“It is clear that no country, no society, no industry has been spared from COVID-19 pandemic, but it has been different from sector to sector,” Landa noted. “Commercial printing has been adversely affected, but in packaging, especially food and pharma, there appears to be a boost for our packaging customers, who are seeing an increased demand for just-in-time printed goods.

“All the signs indicate that commercial printing will rebound, he added. “The world is not going to go back to the old normal. The new normal will be much more digital, with more online shopping more home deliveries, with increased need for fast turnarounds and flexible manufacturing.”

“COVID-19 had a major impact on Landa in the short term, as we have teams doing the installation and support,” said Gordon. “That period lasted for several months, but around August travel restrictions were eased. We had to learn to support our customers remotely. This made our teams more independent. We saw huge declines in print but this month we hope to surpass our pre-corona levels.”

drupa 2020 and Landa Digital Printing
Landa said that LDP is definitely exhibiting at drupa 2020.

“I love drupa,” he added. “It is the only trade show that LDP has exhibited at. In the last 25 years of my career, the customer invariably says they fell in love with the technology when they saw it at drupa. Yes, we definitely plan to participate at the next drupa, if we feel it is safe for our employees and our visitors. The postponement of drupa has had a silver lining, as it has forced us to hold events online. This means that communicating and trade shows will never be the same again.”

The Future of Printing
There is plenty of room for Landa to grow. Gordon pointed out that only 3% of printing is done digitally.

“Landa has everything we need to grow that,” he added. “There are places for tens of thousands of digital presses. There is huge diversity in what is being printed – boxes, magazines, print runs from 1 to 10 to some runs exceeding 10,000. What is common to our customers are mostly people who see the value in seeing the industry change, and want to be on the leading edge of that change.”

Landa spoke about how the printing industry is evolving.

“For most of my time, I have been proselytizing why customers and brand owners need digital printing, and the most amazing thing is that the world seems to have turned upside down, and our customers are telling us why they need digital printing and why they need it now,” Landa said. “This transformation is startling to me. There is a new awareness of the power of mass customization. I think one of the triggers were the bottles of Coca-Cola that were customized with names. It had a profound effect on marketing managers at most of the major brands. It is an entirely new thing for me to be so desired.

“I started Landa Digital Printing to focus on mainstream printing,” Landa added. “To meet the needs of mainstream markets means high speed, formats, longer run lengths at top quality and offset economics, so we invented Nanography, and printing will never be the same."