C.P. Bourg has announced enhancements to its in-line booklet making solution available for the HP Indigo 7x00 Digital Press series. The C.P. Bourg Booklet Maker ExPress (BM-e ExPress), which was developed in collaboration with HP, now boasts fully integrated in-line capabilities with the all-new HP Indigo 7900 Digital Press and the HP Indigo Direct-to-Finish workflow integration system. The BM-e ExPress is aimed at the growing high-quality, full-color booklet-making segment of the stitch-fold-trim finishing market in digital on-demand and web-to-print production environments. The robust in-line booklet maker has been developed to operate 24/7 at the full speed of the HP Indigo 7900 Digital Press.

The BM-e ExPress with the Bourg Sheet Feeder (BSF) option is able to run in-line, near-line and in dual-mode finishing. When connected in-line with the new HP Indigo 7900 Digital Press and HP Indigo Direct-to-Finish finishing automation software, booklets are produced with automatic size adjustments on-the-fly. In the near-line mode, booklets and pre-cut sets of sheets are automatically stitched into sets while the HP Indigo Digital Press is printing a completely separate job. With HP Indigo Direct-to-Finish, the dual-mode finishing gives users of digital presses the ability to send jobs from multiple print streams to their dedicated in-line finishers: the best of both worlds!

The BM-e ExPress with the BSF is already providing value for Lake County Press, where it is installed in-line with the HP Indigo 7800 Digital Press, the forerunner of the 7900. “Having the Bourg equipment in-line/near-line gives us the most versatility with a single device” said Daniel F Murphy, Senior Vice President-Director of Manufacturing. “We can print on the HP Indigo and feed to the press feeder while simultaneously running a totally different job on the Bourg, or we can run the HP and in-line finish the books.”

With HP Indigo Direct-to-Finish, the job finishing data is communicated to the JDF-enabled finishing devices. The devices set up and operate automatically and accurately, based on instructions provided by the print server finishing plan included in the job ticket template. This saves a significant amount of time in make-ready, reduces errors and eliminates waste. Less expertise is required to operate those devices as the decisions are made by expert systems, and the information is as accurate as possible (no manual measuring or coding), and the instructions provided are precise.

"We are pleased to collaborate with HP Indigo on this significant product development, automating the finishing operations is the next frontier in production efficiency,” said Sacha-Vittorio Paolucci, Commercial Director at C.P. Bourg s.a. Gershon Alon, Partner Program Manager at HP Indigo, added: “This is another exciting milestone in our ongoing cooperation with C.P. Bourg. The in-line integration of our HP Indigo 7900 Digital Press with the C.P. Bourg Booklet Maker ExPress and the near-line connectivity with Direct-to-Finish workflow will allow our customers to streamline their stitched booklets production and boost productivity by handling high volumes of short-run jobs in a fully automated way.”