Business News
Heidelberg wins several design awards – product design underlines the digital future of the print media industry
Friday 27. October 2017 - German Design Award for three different models - Speedmaster XL 106, Primefire 106, and Omnifire 250
Special mention for Omnifire 1000
High user friendliness and optimized operation flow are key contributors to further productivity gains
Heidelberger Druckmaschinen AG (Heidelberg) has received awards from the German Design Council in Frankfurt for the outstanding design of its machines, as it was announced on 20 October in cooperation with the specialist journal “manager magazin”. The Awards international jury honors design trends leading the way in the German design landscape. The Award, which was established in 2012, is one of the most respected of its kind worldwide, and is highly regarded well beyond specialist circles.
The Speedmaster XL 106 offset printing press was selected as the winner for industrial applications, the new Primefire 106 digital printing press as the winner for digitized, personalized packaging, and the new Omnifire 250 as the winner for printing three-dimensional objects like balls, drinking bottles, or cell phone covers, with the Omnifire 1000 model receiving a special mention by the jury.
Focus on customer benefit
Heidelbergs design philosophy focuses on user friendliness and the benefit for the customer. Clear shapes underline the functions and workflows, provide orientation, and ensure ergonomic, safe operation. The user interface of all series is standardized, simple, and clearly structured, enabling a seamless switch between machine formats.
“We achieve this with a clear, geometric machine design and by accentuating the key functions like feeders, printing units, and deliveries,” explains head designer Bernd Reibl. Standard design elements used across all series visualize the digitality, quality, and precision of the machines. The silver line of the gallery, for example, stands for networking and workflow across all processes, from prepress through press to post-press. The eye-catching portal on the delivery directs the view to the finished print product. On the digital printing presses, black glass as a modern element stands for digitization and gives an insight into the personalized printing process.
The high user friendliness and optimized operating sequences are key contributors to further productivity gains and are valued by customers as a brand hallmark of Heidelberg products.
Outstanding design
The design of Heidelberg machines has long been considered exemplary in the print media sector. To date, the company has won more than 50 international design awards including German Design Awards, iF Design Awards by the International Forum Design (iF) in Hanover and Red Dot Awards by the Design Zentrum Nordrhein Westfalen.
This years German Design Awards will be presented in February 2018 during the “Ambiente” consumer goods trade fair in Frankfurt.
The product and industrial designers around Bernd Reibl do not just put their creative talents to use for Heidelberg. The company offers design services for all industries on the open market under the name “Heidelberg Industrial Design”. It focuses on strategic and operational industrial design and design of user interfaces, counting amongst its customers numerous global players from the B2B arena.