At drupa 2012, Benny Landa, the founder and creative mind behind Indigo Digital Printing, unveiled Landa Digital Printing, his newest printing press company. Landa launched his Landa Nanographic Printing Presses, which combined digital technologies with offset scale through the use of nanotechnology.

Landa Nanographic Printing Presses are B1 format, which is the standard print production format used in offset for commercial and package printing. Today, the company reports that Landa presses can attain offset quality – including production of 96% of the Pantone color range – on any coated or uncoated paper, at 6,500 sheets per hour. With that color range, there is no need to mix special colors, thus saving time, money and inventory.

It took some time to perfect Landa Nanographic Printing; I met with Benny Landa at drupa 2016, and he made it clear that he would not ship presses before the technology was working perfectly. In fact, Indigo was almost destroyed as a company before it started by shipping presses that needed to be returned due to defects. After beta testing his Landa Nanographic Printing Presses, Landa was shipping his presses by 2018. Today, Landa Nanographic Printing Presses can be found worldwide.

“Landa Digital Printing’s presence throughout the commercial printing and package printing sectors is growing all over the globe,” said Amir Shalev, market development director, Landa Digital Printing.

“Customers are happy to have the Landa press fit in with existing work while allowing them to respond faster to requests from the market,” Shalev added. “Landa presses are increasing overall plant yields by effectively producing jobs that were inefficient on offset, while being much more productive than customers’ legacy digital equipment.

“Our customers are enthusiastic to the point where they are proactively speaking about the presses and developing Landa-centric campaigns,” Shalev noted. “They are experimenting, showing us things the press can do – that we didn’t know about – and sending us news of the breakthroughs they’ve made.”

As the market grows, so does the need for Landa Nanoink, which was originally only produced in Israel. To meet these needs, Landa is opening a new ink production plant in Sittard, The Netherlands, joining its first production facility in Israel.

Landa Nanoink

Landa Nanoink is, as the name suggests, a nanoparticle ink. Many materials, when reduced to nanoparticle size, acquire unexpected properties. For example, in coatings systems, some particles become super-hard, able to protect surfaces from abrasion. In the course of a decade of research, Landa observed that ink pigments, when reduced to nanometric scale, become unusually powerful colorants.

It was crucial to get the Landa Nanoink working perfectly, and Shalev noted that customers have reported that Landa NanoInk is running well on the press.

“It was essential that we perfect ink interaction with press components, processes, and paper, and we are glad to see these efforts deliver so well,” said Shalev. “Regarding the way it looks on the finished product, because of the unique way we print, Landa generates high quality results that our customers… and their customers… love.”

Shalev observed that Landa NanoInk’s successful performance on press, as well as its excellent production capabilities, can be attributed to several factors. These include, but are not limited to, the following:
• The ink is already dry when it is laid it down on the substrate.
• No pre-treatment is required.
• Because the image is dry, no ink is absorbed into the paper. The printed image doesn’t suffer any degradation and retains its full saturation and fidelity.
• Because light absorption is critical to image quality, and because pigment particle size determines light absorption rates, Landa spent years researching nanopigments to find the perfect particle size for best image results.

The new ink plant built in Sittard, The Netherlands, has doubled the company’s production of Landa Nanoink. Shalev said there are a variety of benefits to adding a new plant in Europe, including reduced shipping costs of finished inks and closer proximity to customers.

“We chose to build a plant in Europe because of its proximity to customers, and because it is efficient for sourcing and distribution,” Shalev said. “This helps us in keeping service levels high while controlling costs and maintaining environmental stewardship.

“The Netherlands and Sittard, in particular, offer excellent conditions from both an environmental and business perspective,” added Shalev. “In Sittard, we utilize green energy and other sustainably-responsible advantages.” 

This may not be the only new ink plant in Landa’s future. Shalev noted that Landa Digital Printing is also doing well in the US.

“We see terrific demand from the American market,” Shalev concluded. “It could be an option in the future.”