Koenig & Bauer Open House 'Expand Your Business Model'

• Live presentations from high-volume production, through medium runs to short-run segments
• A platform for in-depth exchange with experts from various Koenig & Bauer business units
• Complete solutions for folding carton production for packaging printers, converters, and commercial printers
• New technologies from Koenig & Bauer Vision & Protection for enhanced brand protection
• Three sheetfed offset presses, one highly productive digital printing press, four die-cutters, and two folder gluers, plus the myKyana digital ecosystem – all tailored to the individual requirements of the market segments – were in operation

Koenig & Bauer recently hosted its 'Expand Your Business Model' Open House at its Customer Experience Centre in Radebeul, near Dresden, from 6 to 15 May. The event welcomed numerous decision-makers and print experts from Europe, North and South America, Asia, and Africa, all keen to learn about current trends and expand their business models within, or into, the packaging print sector.

The printing industry faces significant challenges: rising material and energy costs are squeezing profitability, while growing environmental awareness demands sustainable production methods. Simultaneously, customers are requesting increasingly customised and faster productions. Intense competition and a growing shortage of skilled labour further exacerbate the situation. To help users tackle these challenges, Koenig & Bauer showcased innovative technologies and services that support printing companies in the folding carton, label, commercial, and corrugated board sectors in future-proofing their business models.

Attendees experienced an impressive array of technologies for the printing industry, especially for folding carton production, and gathered inspiration for new business models. This included highly efficient solutions for small, medium, and large runs, as well as forward-looking business models for both packaging specialists and commercial printers looking to expand their operations. The event featured three Rapida sheetfed offset presses in two different format classes and configurations, the highly productive VariJET 106 digital printing press, various die-cutters (two flatbed and two rotary die-cutters), and two different folder gluers, each tailored to the specific requirements of the market segments. Koenig & Bauer Kyana's digital ecosystem, myKyana, provided attendees with comprehensive and immediate insights into its added value throughout the event.

The event's opening and first highlight was the impressive 'From Zero to Carton Hero in 15 Minutes' production. In well under 15 minutes, Koenig & Bauer experts demonstrated the entire folding carton production value chain – from prepress, through printing, die-cutting, and folder-gluing, right up to the dispatch-ready packaging.

This rapid production is founded on high production outputs, fully automated set-up processes, maximum automation, and intuitive operation, all typical of Koenig & Bauer machinery. Added to this are preset functions and solutions for significantly reducing waste. The aim is short lead times to boost productivity and extensive support for machine operators, relieving them of routine tasks and counteracting the shortage of skilled labour seen in many regions. Koenig & Bauer provides crucial support here with continuous workflows from job preparation to post-calculation (LogoTronic, JobOptimiser, Optimus Dash, PrintFusion), the Koenig & Bauer Ecosystem myKyana, and extensive features for fully automatic quality management (from register measurement and colour control to quality regulation and inline sheet inspection).

In this initial live presentation, Koenig & Bauer impressively demonstrated its leading role as a comprehensive solution provider for print and postpress technology, as well as for data-based and AI-based support such as Kyana Assist, JobOptimiser, and PrintFusion in folding carton production.

Further live productions showcased the performance of Koenig & Bauer technologies in high-volume production with particularly high sheet counts, as well as in the medium and short-run segments (from one to around 5,000 sheets).

In the high-volume and medium-run packaging segment, a Rapida 106 X with eight printing units and double coating, and a seven-colour Rapida 76 with a coating unit were in operation. The latter is a version optimised for printing high-quality luxury packaging, demonstrating excellent, industry-leading print quality, particularly for coloured surfaces. Both machines produced jobs with high-quality coating finishes and, in some cases, drip-off effects, which were then processed further on the Ipress 106 PRO and CutPRO Q 106 flatbed die-cutters, the folding carton version of the CutPRO X 106 rotary die-cutter, and the Omega Allpro 110 folder gluer. All productions ran at maximum outputs of 22,000 sheets/hour on the Rapida 106 X, 15,000/16,000 sheets/hour on the CutPRO X 106, and a belt speed of up to 400 m/min on the Omega Allpro 110 folder gluer.

Specifically for commercial printers looking to expand into the growing packaging market, Koenig & Bauer demonstrated the hybrid production of commercial prints, labels, and short-run packaging on a seven-colour Rapida 106 X with a reel-to-sheet feeder, coating unit, and ColdFoiler. Further processing was carried out with a CutPRO X 106 rotary die-cutter and the Ipress 106 PRO SB flatbed die-cutter.

To counteract rising costs, the shortage of skilled labour, and competitive pressure, automated guided vehicles (AGVs) offer a solution for optimising internal logistics. These were in use during the live shows, impressively demonstrating how substrate transport already takes place in highly automated packaging operations today and how it will become increasingly prevalent in more printing and packaging companies in the future. In parallel, myKyana, with its bundled data and AI-supported products, offers a central answer to these challenges and provides immediate support to companies. Kyana Data, Koenig & Bauer's production data analysis tool, enables data-driven insights into production processes to identify maintenance needs early, prevent machine failures, and thus directly increase efficiency and competitiveness. The shortage of skilled labour is addressed by the AI expert Kyana Assist, which offers immediate, multilingual support and significantly simplifies the onboarding of new employees.

As an industry innovation, Koenig & Bauer presented the integration of postpress machines into the myKyana digital ecosystem. True to the Open House motto 'Expand Your Business Model', Koenig & Bauer's data- and AI-supported digital products bundled in myKyana offer tangible added value for production optimisation. Customers now benefit from unique, continuous data transparency across the entire production process, extending from the printing press to postpress, and including both Koenig & Bauer and third-party machines. This comprehensive end-to-end view allows customers to track the entire production flow in real-time, precisely identify bottlenecks, and use data-based insights for optimisation. This leads to measurable improvements in throughput, quality, and resource efficiency.

The VariJET 106 showcased the impressive capabilities of digital folding carton printing. The machine combines the flexibility of inkjet printing for versioning, localisation, and campaigns, etc., for efficient printing of small and medium runs with the finishing expertise of offset printing, without any quality differences. Due to its outstanding print quality and the ability to optimally address future customer requirements, it is an ideal addition, especially for packaging companies that use offset presses. The VariJET 106 produces all short and variable runs and also enables shorter delivery times. It helps ensure that longer and more profitable jobs can be produced on the sheetfed offset presses.

During the live production, the VariJET 106 printed folding cartons with variable content and security features invisible to the human eye. These enhance brand protection and are based on a new technology from Koenig & Bauer Vision & Protection. Since the entire value chain was also demonstrated here, further processing took place immediately on a CutPRO X 106 rotary die-cutter and an Omega Allpro 70 folder gluer. Digital printing enables shorter time-to-market and significantly reduces set-up effort and waste.

To cater individually to the needs of the event participants, breakout sessions were offered as a key part of the event, providing opportunities for intensive exchange with Koenig & Bauer experts. These comprehensively informed attendees about current packaging topics, workflow solutions, and special applications in areas such as high-volume packaging, short-run packaging, packaging/labels for commercial print including postpress, myKyana, brand/product protection, and the print production of corrugated board packaging.

All parts of the event impressively demonstrated Koenig & Bauer's commitment to contributing to the business success of printing and packaging companies. At this event, Koenig & Bauer once again made its 'Trusted Advisor' claim tangible for guests – supporting business partners in overcoming their daily challenges related to cost efficiency, sustainability, competitive pressure, the shortage of skilled labour, and changing customer needs.