News Article Country Wide

Langenhagen, Germany, August 2008

With its new bizhub PRO C6501 series and the bizhub PRO C5501 digital colour production printing systems Konica Minolta lives up to its motto “Scale up”. Introduced to the public at this year’s drupa, these colour professionals are advancements of Konica Minolta’s existing successful production printing systems. The new series provides customers with even finer colour, improved image quality and swifter production speed. High media flexibility and advanced finishing capabilities, especially those of the bizhub PRO C6501e/eP, further distinguish the new systems.

 

“Scale up” is Konica Minolta’s motto for its great strides towards a leading role in the production printing segment. The extensive range of new hardware, along with the high-performance, highly integrable end-to-end software solutions presented at this year’s drupa Konica Minolta testifies to this self-assured approach. There, the new bizhub PRO C6501 series and the bizhub PRO C5501 production printing systems that have now been launched were on display for the first time.

Common to the four colour production printing systems – which also have received a facelift in their design – is their reliable and flexible productivity. With a print speed of between 55 A4 colour pages per minute for the bizhub PRO C5501 and 65 colour pages for the bizhub PRO C6501 series, they offer a large throughput. All systems offer heavy duty cycles too. To better meet customers’ needs, the bizhub PRO C5501 now also supports three print controllers: the external controllers IC-304 Plus powered by Creo, the IC-305 EFI Fiery and the internal IC-408 EFI Fiery controller.

Furthermore, impressive media flexibility ensures central reprographic departments (CRDs), commercial printers (CP) and high volume offices can meet the most diverse requests in terms of print jobs: All systems can process paper formats from A5 to A3+ (330 x 487 mm) and weights ranging from 64 to 300 g/m² via the regular paper feeders and the bypass tray.

All four devices come up with advancements in image and colour quality to ensure that colour is precise and consistent in larger print runs: Simitri HD high definition polymerised toner is used with all four newly launched digital colour printing systems. The environmentally friendly toner ensures fine lines and superb image quality. Another integral part of all digital colour printing systems is the S.E.A.D. technology, Konica Minolta’s own screen-enhancing active digital processing technology. This proprietary technology does its share to improve image quality, colour consistency and sharpness of text. It was originally developed for the bizhub PRO C6500 series, the predecessor of the new series – and a very successful predecessor it was. According to a study by InfoSource covering the past year, the bizhub PRO C6500/e was the best selling system in the production printing market in Germany last year. It was also the system that has been responsible for Konica Minolta’s 12.3% increase in market share in the professional colour market.

Improvements to the systems’ advanced finishing qualities make room for “Scale up” in meeting customers’ demands and, in turn, boost their business opportunities. The new series and the bizhub PRO C5501 can be equipped with finishing features for stapling, punching, folding and booklet making. Especially the bizhub PRO C6501e/eP offers professional advanced finishing to satisfy the special needs of CRDs, CPs and print for pay (PfP) environments: a wider range of folding options, trimming and perfect binding are added finishing capabilities with this system. With 16 different configurations, the bizhub PRO 6501e/eP can also be precisely tailored to customers’ needs.

“We are confident that the bizhub PRO C6501 series and the bizhub PRO C5501 will top its predecessors in terms of success,” says Karl-Friedrich Edenhuizen, Product Manager at Konica Minolta Business Solutions Europe. “Not only does the whole series of new bizhub PROs provide our customers with the three essential elements of high quality colour production printing, which are outstanding colour, superior image quality and high production speed. Their sturdy yet compact built and various in-line finishing functions also mean a further ‘Scale up’ in benefits for our customers.”

 

About Konica Minolta Business Solutions Europe

Konica Minolta Business Solutions Europe GmbH is a leading provider of image information products with subsidiaries and distributors in more than 50 countries in the EMEA region. The company places major emphasis on the document management and solution business in the office and production environment, especially in the field of colour output as well as related supplies. Konica Minolta Business Solutions Europe is a subsidiary of Konica Minolta Business Technologies, Inc., headquartered in Tokyo, Japan. With a total workforce of 21,000 employees worldwide, Konica Minolta Business Technologies gained net sales of over 4.4 billion euros in fiscal 2006/2007. Building on its strong core of optical technologies developed over many years as a printer and camera manufacturer, Konica Minolta Business Technologies aims to be a corporation offering products and services that are essential to all areas of digital imaging.

www.konicaminolta.eu

Terms and product names may be trademarks or registered trademarks of their respective holders and are hereby acknowledged.

Product images are available at www.konicaminolta-images.com

 

Contact:

Karl-Friedrich Edenhuizen

Konica Minolta Business Solutions Europe
Phone: +49 (0)511 7404-377

Karl.Edenhuizen(at)konicaminolta.eu

 

Claudia Bitzer

Pleon GmbH

Phone: +49 (0)711 210 99-416

KonicaMinoltaTeam(at)pleon.com