manroland web systems
thrilled with drupa 2012 results
Numerous orders booked at drupa 2012
SK Khurana, editor, AAN with Peter Kuisle, executive vice president, sales, service
and marketing at manroland web systems
GmbH at drupa 2012.
|
After having adopted an independent entity comprising of web operations under the new ownership of L Possehl & Co GmbH, manroland web systems has had a fantastic start and reported several big orders placed at drupa 2012. The newly formed company with a strong ownership structure has ambitious plans to grow and retain their market leadership in the web offset market. With the latest successful projects, manroland web systems continues to lead the web offset press market for newspaper and commercial printing. In recent years, manroland’s share of the global market for new presses and extensions has averaged around one third, which makes it the number one supplier. With heatset printing systems, more than 40 percent of all new orders were placed with manroland during this period, and for newspaper presses manroland also leads the way with a market share of almost 30 percent for new presses.
With strong plans in place to serve their existing customers and prospects rather effectively, the company looks forward to a strong future ahead. In a formal interview with AAN editor, SK Khurana on the sidelines of drupa 2012, senior most officials of the company, including Peter Kuisle, executive vice president, sales, service and marketing with manroland web systems GmbH shared their experiences about the formation of the new company and implementing new strategies to effectively fulfill the expectations of the new owner and retain profitability, possibly by entering new fields and maintaining the leading position in the industry.
Long-term assured…
SlidePad – a touchscreen tablet device replacing all ink keys in the press console.
|
manroland web systems, Augsburg, has realigned its business in 2012 and is part of the Lubeck-based Possehl Group since February, as their 10th business division. Their clear strategy – stability, investment security, groundbreaking technology, and a strong service offer – gives the principles that will guide manroland web systems. “The long-term future of the company is assured and we have a strong company structure in place with our excellent products and services for the web offset market” conveyed Kuisle, while responding to a question, with the just-over episode of ownership transfer, what are going to be the initiatives in terms of bringing back the confidence of buyers?
“Under the new ownership, the company is proud to announce that we are retaining our complete product portfolio – we have the youngest and latest product portfolio in the web offset sector.” Uwe Lüders, managing director for manroland web systems is also the chairman of the Board of Possehl group. Uwe Lüders is being supported by a management team of five. Peter Kuisle, vice president sales at manroland for many years, heads the service and sales divisions, complemented by the technical division led by Dieter Betzmeier. Franz Gumpp is responsible for the production and purchasing division. Company development and human resources management are led by Dr Daniel Raffler. Dirk Rauh is leading the commercial division.
With this new management team the new company features a high level of continuity and experience as well as innovation potential. Around 1,500 employees are working for manroland web systems GmbH in Augsburg and in the markets. Moreover the capacities of the manroland site in Plauen are being used via a long-term delivery contract for components.
The digital printing solutions jointly offered by manroland web systems and Océ are practice-oriented, suitable for many business models and immediately available. The product is dedicated for the high volume book printing segment and digital newspaper production,” explained Kuisle further.
“Our autoprint innovations for commercial and newspaper printing, the revolutionary operating concept and the pressupdate portfolio have very obviously impressed customers all over the world. Our wide range of established and new products has also played a significant role,” is how Peter Kuisle, member of the Executive Board at manroland web systems, summarizes the company’s success at drupa 2012 in Düsseldorf.
“We have no plan to shift our manufacturing facility out of Germany to any other country, including China,” replied Kuisle on asking whether they may shift their manufacturing facility to China. Print runs are shrinking, then why this XXL format – 96-page concept in web and sheeted simultaneously? “This concept has been developed specially to cater to the high volume catalogue business, which is expanding rapidly in the mature markets after testing the alternate route of digital screen communication,” he clarified.
Eyes on India…
“The new owners of the manroland web systems also bought over the operations of our Indian subsidiary, manroland India, in February 2012 itself. With this take over, manroland web systems continues its direct presence in India, one of the largest and fastest growing markets in the world. We have ambitious plans to enhance and expand our current offerings for the Indian market, including the launch of new product lines and services like our press update program. We are very proud to announce the launch of our benchmark product CROMOMAN 4-1 with the first installation just completed at The Times of India, Pune facility. The press with the revolutionary double width design is equipped with various value added features designed especially for the Indian market keeping in mind local running conditions in Indian pressrooms. The double wide press has an innovative design with floor mounted reel stands and significantly reduced investment the capital infrastructure required in the pressroom. Our experienced engineering team has installed the press in record time which is currently printing at full capacity. The press at TOI Pune has a configuration of four towers and one folder. More investment will be made in our Indian operations, currently having a dedicated team of individuals in ratio of 70:30 percent of local experts and European professionals respectively,” informed Kuisle.
On asking what is going to be the ultimate model of distribution in India for web and sheetfed presses, he also confirmed that manroland India will continue to sell manroland web as well as manroland sheetfed presses simultaneously.
