Higher white opacity and ink saving with SOMA

Breakthrough with the white ink opacity and ink savings at SOMA

The recent cooperative effort between Marvaco, SOMA, Flint Group and INOMETA has resulted in a breakthrough in white ink opacity and ink savings, dramatically increasing package printing’s positive environmental impact and efficiency. Where white ink consumption is typically half of the total ink consumption, this result offers an enormous potential to total eco-efficiency. 

The development, led by Marvaco and SOMA, has resulted in over 60% opacity of reverse printed white BOPP. The development, utilizing the latest technologies from all the partners, also enables the reduction of ink volume while maintaining the high opacity.

Moreno Melegatti, Technology Center Manager of SOMA, explains, ”Only a few printers are able to reach the same opacity in flexo printing with a single white. Opacities like these typically require high anilox volumes — and even printing white with two passes. We are proud that the SOMA OPTIMA’s new drying system minimizes the effect of ink blocking, while reaching this extremely high opacity.”

Kai Lankinen, Chairman of Marvaco Group, says, “Reaching this level of opacity has been my dream throughout the past 20 years, but new technologies have finally been able to deliver it. The cooperative efforts have resulted significant ink savings, while maintaining the same opacity compared to the use of traditional technologies. Our work included several tests, and I must mention that without the great support from Flint Group and INOMETA, this would not have been possible to achieve.”

Joelle Bédat, Business Development, and Thomas Strohe, Commercial Product Director of Flint Group, are delighted with the superior results, noting how the combination of the latest technologies within Flint Group plates and inks complemented each other to overcome this challenge. The achievement demonstrates the strength of cross-functional collaboration between the companies in order to support packaging printers during these challenging times.

The results were part of the new developments that targeted to Drupa 2020 event. The partners shall reveal more about the detailed results at a later point and bring this new technology available in near future as an advantage to their combined customers.

For more information, please contact:
kai.lankinen@marvaco.com
www.marvaco.com

Tags: #WhiteInk #Opacity #InkSaving #Sustainability #Ecology #Ecoefficiency #Marvaco #SOMA #FlintGroup #Inometa #GreenerPrinting #Flexo #Packaging #Pakkaus