Xeikon has announced VariOne, a new variable data generation tool for Xeikon’s X-800 digital front-end. This integrated software innovation can immediately generate and print unique creative designs based on images or vector graphics in endlessly complex patterns.
Xeikon’s VariOne is a true differentiator developed and designed to add value and benefit brand owners, designers, illustrators, printers, converters, and consumers. VariOne can achieve the highest levels of variable imagery possible today. Demonstrations can be run by appointment, and the new VariOne will be commercially available as an option for systems running X-800 version 7.00 or higher.
Jeroen Van Bauwel, director of Product Management, states: “Print is becoming more customized and valuable. With VariOne, Xeikon has taken a significant leap forward in its research and development and now offers completely new horizons for differentiation. With VariOne, it is possible to create thousands of unique and individual clips from a base design. With our new integrated variable data solution built into Xeikon’s digital front-end, the possibilities for producing unique images are limitless on both our dry toner and inkjet presses. The Xeikon strategy is to extend the capabilities of its X-800 workflow even further and expand the range of possible applications.”
Xeikon’s VariOne can provide complete security from counterfeiters
Differentiating products to meet consumer demand is a continuous challenge for brand owners. Consumers are willing to pay a premium for personalized goods. They are on the lookout for products that uniquely express their personality, which can be shared on social media such as Instagram and Pinterest. In the fight against counterfeiting, which can impact consumer safety, brand owners are looking for new software technology solutions with extra image and text capabilities and hidden techniques to track and trace items such as unique patterns and images, hidden codes, and guilloches. VariOne can be used as a tool to add an extra layer of security.
With Xeikon’s VariOne, personalized image creation can be fully automated within the printing process. The software functionality achieves random selections from zero to millions. This variable data application offers endless uses and endless variations. What sets this innovation apart is the immediacy of the process. VariOne can immediately process, format, and print unique creative designs featuring variable patterns with random elements and the widest gamut of color combinations. Unique designs can be created on the fly and in minutes in a variety of unique patterns. This new innovation is a breakthrough and a complete game-changer.
The advantage of VariOne lies in the complete uniqueness of each design, which can be driven by the database or randomly created from a bitmap or vector-based images, creating new and unusual designs in millions of shapes, styles, and surreal effects. Brand owners will be able to utilize this opportunity in various sectors with different applications for fashion magazines, retail catalogs, tourism marketing, promotional materials for football competitions or film festivals, and high-end label and packaging applications.
For decades, the cost has been the differentiator in our industries, but with the ever-rising costs of consumables and labor, it has now become virtually impossible to be successfully competitive based on that variable only. The focus has shifted to the efficiency gained through automation.
The new functionality of VariOne is the next step in efficient and sustainable variable data production, and VariOne also enables big savings in time and cost, both in prepress and in the pressroom. Van Bauwel concludes, “Xeikon is taking mass customization to new levels with an explosion of creativity which will add value for everyone in the supply chain in a million ways. Xeikon’s VariOne has taken a complicated prepress process and made it immediately fast and flexible.”
