Business News
“Printpoint & ColourProcess achieve world-first”
Wednesday 09. January 2008 - On 18/12/2007 Printpoint Australia became the first printing operation outside Europe to be certified to the PSO, or Print Standard Offset.
PSO is the only vendor-neutral, independent ISO 12647-2 certification standard. By achieving PSO certification, Printpoints waterless operation in Brisbane has been independently audited, confirming they are printing to the highest internationally recognised level.
PSO certification is awarded by forga/bvdm in Germany. In Europe, (and as will now fast become the case here in Australia), PSO certification is viewed by all major printing clients as mandatory to secure print work.
ColourProcess, local fogra partner providing onsite support for the certification according to Process Standard Offset (ISO 12647-2), has audited Printpoints operation to ensure that all their pre-press and pressroom processes and results are aligned with ISO 12647-2. The printed results were sent to fogra in Germany and measured to confirm they are in agreement with the tolerances set down in the standard.
PSO certification is also about process control and consistency, and the results of the process audit were also crucial to Printpoint gaining certification.
Since arriving in Australia from Europe three years ago, Yves Roussange, Director of ColourProcess, has been informing the Australian printing market of the benefits of printing to the ISO standard. This first certification to PSO by an Australian printer marks an important international milestone in proving that Australian printers are capable of achieving international best-practice.
Alan Rhodes, Director of Printpoint Australia said, “Our achievement of PSO certification places the business at the forefront of printing and colour management expertise, and has increased the sustainability and environmental benefits we achieve with our 100% waterless printing plant. From the perspective of our major clients, this is a huge advantage”.
As stated by Yves Roussange, “Printpoint Australia has made an investment in the future of their business. By implementing the ISO standard into their workflow and achieving PSO certification, they have gained the ability to prove to existing and prospective clients that the quality of their work is internationally recognised as being of the highest level”.
Yves also indicated that this is the first of many Australian printers and clients who are looking at PSO certification to improve the quality and consistency of their printing results. “Not only does certification independently prove the level of quality you can produce, it offers time and resource efficiencies, like reducing make-ready times by up to 40%. We are already working with other printing operations and major print buyers on ISO/PSO, and at ColourProcess we are very proud that Printpoint has achieved Australias first PSO certification.”