The Ghent Workgroup (GWG) represents the print and publishing community, including industry, vendors, associations and educational members. HYBRID Software is now joining as a vendor member and thereby commits to fully supporting and incorporating the Ghent Workgroup Specifications into their solution offering.

As a reputed international community of industry leaders across Europe and the US, the Ghent Workgroup consistently produces numerous specifications and best practices for PDF exchange, and tools for automating and testing processes to establish consistent output results.

Most recently, the Ghent Workgroup has released the Ghent PDF Output Suite 5.0, which helps to determine whether workflows are behaving as expected, and identifies errors in a fast and easy way. Earlier this year the group also released the GWG2015 specification, accommodating for new developments and best practices in the industry.

Nick De Roeck, CTO of HYBRID Software, comments: "HYBRID has invested more than 20 man years of software engineering in creating a state of the art PDF library; it sits at the core of all our technology and products like the PACKZ PDF editor and our CLOUDFLOW workflow software. We have a heritage and enduring commitment to the PDF standard, and are very honored and excited to join the GWG. We think it is a fantastic and unique forum of industry stakeholders, where vendors and users jointly work for the benefit of all PDF customers."

David Zwang, Chairman, Ghent Workgroup, concludes: “We are very excited to have HYBRID Software join the GWG to help us continue our focus on packaging production workflows and best practices. Their experience in the field of packaging production complements our already strong body of knowledge.”

As international association representing the print and publishing community, the Ghent Workgroup needs your knowledge and expertise on PDF workflow to participate in a survey. It takes just a few minutes to complete and the survey can also be shared with others PDF workflow users.

The Ghent Workgroup, formed in June 2002, is an international assembly of Industry Associations, suppliers, Educators and Industry members from around the globe. The Ghent Workgroup’s objective is to establish and disseminate process specifications for best practices in graphic arts workflows.

Since its inception almost fifteen years ago, the organization has consistently produced numerous process specifications for PDF exchange, as well as developing useful tools for automating processes and testing and establishing consistent PDFs for print and publishing – all available free at: www.gwg.org.

Members are comprised of graphic arts associations including: BPIF (UK), CIP4 (Switzerland), CMBO (the Netherlands), ERA (Germany), Febelgra (Belgium), FESPA (UK), FTA (USA), Medibel+ (Belgium), PDFX-ready (Switzerland), Printing Industries of America (USA), UNIIC (France) and VIGC (Belgium).

Vendor members include: Adobe, Agfa, callas software, CHILI publish, Dalim Software, EFI, Enfocus, Esko, GMG, Heidelberg, Hybrid Software, Kodak, Océ, Ricoh, Quark, Ultimate Technographics, and Xerox IMPIKA. Industry members are: JP/Politikenhus, Litografia Rosés, PB-Consult, Phototype, Pragmeta, Sagamgraphic and Square. Educational members are: Ryerson University and University of Wuppertal.