“We have worked with large publications for their offset needs and were constantly posed with the question as to when would we foray into the POD segment. Seven months back we decided to invest to strengthen our position in this segment,” said Ashish Daftari, senior manager- sales, Thomson Press.

In the last three months, the press has been producing around 8,000 books every month. “We chose Canon because of the black and white, halftones and graphics quality it provides. Also the maximum print-size of the machine is also half-an-inch larger compared to machines from other digital printing production press manufacturing companies,” he adds.

Daftari maintains that the machine was finalised only days before Drupa, as Thomson wanted to test the market for POD books which according to him, is an unexplored opportunity in India. “There aren’t many big companies who are engaged in the POD segment in India. POD is growing at a phenomenal rate of 100%.”

Thomson has also installed a battery of book finishing machines alongside the Canon imagePress 1135. This includes a Shoei folding machine, Smiths sewing machine, Fortec casemaker, a joint-forming machine from Joy D-zign Engineers, a cutting machine from Proteck and nipping machines.

Asked if Thomson plans to invest in another ImagePress 1135, Daftari said, “We would be installing another cut-sheet digital press within the next three months. However, this would be a machine would have higher production capacity.” Daftari also shared that Thomson plans to reach the mark of 20,000 books per month from its POD division before graduating into inkjet B2 press.