Bartaman Patrika books Manroland Cromoman 4-1 press
Kolkata-based Bengali language newspaper Bartaman Patrika has bought a three-tower Manroland Cromoman 4-1 press.
16 Feb 2018 | 35946 Views | By Rushikesh Aravkar
This will be the fourth Cromoman installation in India. Manroland has already installed two Cromoman 4-1 presses at Bennett, Coleman & Co – Pune and Kolkata – and one at Namaste Telangana.
The press has been sold with a Service Level Agreement and is the second Cromoman 4-1 to be installed in Eastern India, said a Manroland spokesperson.
Bartaman Patrika is the second-most widely read Bengali newspaper in India after Anandabazar Patrika. It is a Bengali daily published from Kolkata, West Bengal. Besides the Kolkata edition, the newspaper publishes three more editions from Burdwan and Midnapore.
Sudeep Bhattacharjee, managing director, Manroland India, said, “This deal is significant for Manroland Web Systems as it signals our entry into the flourishing Indian language newspaper market. This helps assuage the feeling that Manroland presses are an expensive piece of machinery, not suitable for the regional newspaper market in India”.
Bhattacharjee said, the Indian language newspaper market is growing at a CAGR of more than 8%; today nine out of ten top dailies in India are players in the regional space.
The Cromoman ordered by Bartaman is a three-tower 4-1 press. The press is capable of versatile printing possibilities such as 24-page or 16-pages plus 8-page format. It will be equipped with Pecom-X control system, which enables “easy operation and short make-ready and changeover times.”
The Cromoman 4-1 has been designed to suit the requirements of the Indian market. “It is a modular double-width press that can cater to average run-length between 2,50,000 – 4,00,000 copies per night, power fluctuations tolerance, fit into existing buildings, runs smoothly on Indian newsprint with no web severance. It requires no air conditioning and offers web width variability,” said Bhattacharjee.
Manroland Web Systems has an installed base of 28 web offset presses in India.