Waiblingen – Germany, February 12, 2009 – At the Hunkeler innovationdays, AlphaPicture will present the world’s first highspeed generator for inline image personalization. In a live performance at the exhibition, a Xeikon 8000 digital color press will be in action, printing image-personalized transpromo mailers that will proceed for inline finishing on Hunkeler modules.

AlphaPicture’s highspeed imaging generators – which were showcased as a prototype at Drupa 2008 – have already proved their strength in December 2008. DHL Paket’s new 12-page brochures that included millions of personalized images gave the AlphaPicture generators the ideal opportunity to demonstrate their superb efficiency and unbelievable speed, namely, their ability to generate up to 1000 images per minute which have been created in the printing room and embedded into ready-to-print PDFs that are transferred to the RIP of the digital printer – without having to compromise on quality. The optimized PDF feature helps reduce the data volume to one tenth while simultaneously accelerating the ripping process by a factor of seven. AlphaPicture generators can thus achieve an excellent output which is more than sufficient to provide a continuous data stream that would keep even the fastest highspeed generators busy, thereby opening wholly new areas of applications for image personalization in transpromo and white space marketing – applications nobody dared to dream of just one year back.

Four partners – one goal: the perfect transpromo demonstration

Since the Drupa, experts have been waiting in anticipation to see how transpromo works in real life. Before an eager audience that will gather in the exhibition halls on the banks of Lake Lucerne, AlphaPicture and its technology partners, Punch Graphix, GMC and Hunkeler, are keen to demonstrate what state-of-the-art technology will actually look like in 2009. Even at the industry-best, maximum speed of 230 ppm, the Xeikon 8000 does an excellent job in printing the color-intensive AlphaPicture motifs without the slightest loss to color depth or intensity. The high resolution of the digital press with up to 1200 dpi at 4 bit/pixel guarantees that even the minutest detail of a personalized image can be recognized straightaway.

By demonstrating a sophisticated full-color transpromo for an air miles loyalty program offered by a fictitious airline company, XeiWings.com, it will be possible to show how accounts for bonus miles (transactions) are coupled to prizes (promotions). Depending on the miles collected by the customer, the corresponding bonus gifts are illustrated in color – in some cases, these gifts can also be gender-specific, for instance, perfumes for women or special watches for women or men. To make the incentive for flying additional miles more attractive, the next-best top prize is displayed through image personalization. As the number of miles gathered increases, so too does the attractiveness of the prizes – the allure being a weekend stay at a luxury resort on Waikiki Beach. In the case of Waikiki, for instance, it is ideal to portray a surfboard on the beach, personalized with artistic lettering that reads: “Have fun, Peter!” or “Have fun, Frank!”, depending, of course, on the name of the recipient or winner.

The data-intensive workflow is streamlined through the powerful combination of the Xeikon 8000’s digital front-end, the X-800 and its IPDS Controller which handles the IPDS input data stream directly, without intermediate conversions, resulting in a highly productive process of printing full-color AlphaPicture personalized documents at rated engine speed. 7000 personalized, 6-page transpromo self-mailers are churned out every hour. In an inline configuration of Hunkeler finishing modules, the mailing is cut, perforated, folded in three, and glued. Furthermore, the page containing transactional information is punched for easy filing. The mailings are finally combined in batches, tied together and made ready for delivery at a postal services provider.
Industry professionals and specialists can follow the production of transpromo mailers live in Lucerne. Concurrently, personalized websites with personalized URLs such as www.XeiWings.com/first_name_surname will be generated. The prizes will be displayed on these PURLs, where visitors can access the password-protected site and place their orders online.

The Hunkeler innovationdays 2009 will be held at the Allmend Lucerne Trade Fair site. From Monday, February 16, to Thursday, February 19, visitors can view the Xeikon 8000 in action at the Punch Graphix stand (Hall 1, Booth 4), where it will be busy printing personalized images by AlphaPicture.

AlphaPicture i-clue Maertterer GmbH, based in Stuttgart, Germany, was founded in 1997. Today, AlphaPicture is the world market leader in ASP image personalization, boasting customers on every continent. Out of this core area AlphaPicture developed several different other applications in personalising media. Such as personalized mailings, videos, emails, magazines and transpromo printings. AlphaPicture focuses on ASP-solutions. For this reason the customers all over the world do have acces 24/7 to their online applications. Additionally AlphaPicture is installing highspeed imaging generators at digital printhouses and offers complete web-to-print solutions. Together with partners in New York, Tokio, Warsaw, Rotterdam and Oxford AlphaPicture provides a worldwide service network. www.alphapicture.com

Tobias Märtterer jr.
AlphaPicture i-clue Maertterer GmbH
Endersbacher Strasse 57
71334 Waiblingen
Germany
Tel.: +49 (0) 7151-20583-73
Fax: +49 (0) 7151-20583-55
press@alphapicture.com
www.alphapicture.com

This release was published on openPR.