Domino Launches New Variable Data Printing Solution for Pharmaceutical Applications

Domi­no is pleased to announce the launch of the new K600G – an inno­v­a­tive new blis­ter foil and web dig­i­tal print­ing solu­tion for prod­uct-lev­el seri­al­i­sa­tion in phar­ma­ceu­ti­cal applications. 

Devel­oped in col­lab­o­ra­tion with phar­ma­ceu­ti­cal indus­try inno­va­tor Gal­larus, and with engage­ment from life sci­ence indus­try experts SeaV­i­sion, the K600G is a ground-break­ing, high-res­o­lu­tion, dig­i­tal print­ing solu­tion. The result of suc­cess­ful team­work between mar­ket lead­ers in dig­i­tal print and life sci­ence experts, the K600G promis­es to meet the needs of phar­ma­ceu­ti­cal man­u­fac­tur­ers now and in the future.

“Over the last cou­ple of years seri­al­i­sa­tion at pack lev­el has become a glob­al require­ment in the phar­ma­ceu­ti­cal indus­try,” says Craig Sto­bie, Direc­tor of Glob­al Sec­tor Devel­op­ment at Domi­no. “In the future, it is like­ly that seri­al­i­sa­tion of indi­vid­ual pock­ets of a blis­ter pack will become the new stan­dard, in order to fur­ther enhance patient safe­ty and reduce med­ical errors.

“The K600G has been devel­oped to pro­vide man­u­fac­tur­ers with an on-site solu­tion for vari­able data print­ing, which includes cod­ing at the item lev­el, to meet these future require­ments,” he continues. 

Using dig­i­tal print­ing tech­nol­o­gy to cus­tomise prod­uct pack­ag­ing with­in man­u­fac­tur­ing chains adds a degree of agili­ty that allows phar­ma­ceu­ti­cal man­u­fac­tur­ers to react more eas­i­ly to leg­isla­tive changes or vari­a­tions in prod­uct labelling require­ments, as it reduces reliance on exter­nal pack­ag­ing providers. 

The new K600G includes a range of solu­tions that have been devel­oped for dif­fer­ent instal­la­tion types, includ­ing off-line, near-line, top-of-line, sealed-blis­ter-cod­ing for print­ing direct­ly on formed blis­ter packs, and an inte­grat­ed-line ver­sion devel­oped to meet the needs of OEMs. 

“Dig­i­tal print­ing and flex­i­ble sup­ply chains are begin­ning to play a much greater role in phar­ma­ceu­ti­cal man­u­fac­tur­ing – and so the K600G is a nec­es­sary invest­ment to keep up with future leg­is­la­tion and mar­ket trends,” says Volk­er Watzke, EU Med­ical Devices Sec­tor Man­ag­er at Domino.

 “As Domi­no cus­tomers, phar­ma­ceu­ti­cal man­u­fac­tur­ers util­is­ing the K600G solu­tion also have the ben­e­fit of our glob­al experts, who are always ready to sup­port them when they need us,” he adds. “We want to ensure that our cus­tomers are always in con­trol of their lines.”

When it comes to print­ing per­for­mance, the K600G achieves high-qual­i­ty, reli­able print­ing across a range of sub­strates – the print­ing mod­ule has a native res­o­lu­tion of 600dpi and excel­lent greyscale capa­bil­i­ty. Based on Domino’s mar­ket-lead­ing piezo drop-on-demand ink jet tech­nol­o­gy, the print­er is also capa­ble of build­ing up imagery using mul­ti­ple dif­fer­ent drop sizes – this improves image qual­i­ty and gives man­u­fac­tur­ers more con­trol over their ink consumption. 

 “In phar­ma­ceu­ti­cal man­u­fac­tur­ing, code qual­i­ty and leg­i­bil­i­ty are of key impor­tance, and, owing to the cost of unplanned down­time, it is also imper­a­tive that machines are kept func­tion­ing at opti­mal per­for­mance,” says Bart Vansteenkiste, Glob­al Sec­tor Man­ag­er — Life Sci­ences at Domi­no. “The K600G was devel­oped with this lev­el of reli­a­bil­i­ty and dura­bil­i­ty in mind with auto­mat­ed main­te­nance sys­tems to reduce oper­a­tor inter­ven­tion and to keep the sys­tem run­ning at opti­mal performance.” 

In order to achieve the high­est lev­els of effi­cien­cy, the sys­tem can also be sup­plied with a unique AI soft­ware, that col­lects, analy­ses, and learns from fac­to­ry data to pro­vide intel­li­gent man­u­fac­tur­ing solutions.

 “With the K600G, we have com­bined the key prin­ci­ples of Indus­try 4.0 to pro­vide a solu­tion that address­es the evolv­ing life sci­ence envi­ron­ment and pro­duc­tion chal­lenges fac­ing phar­ma­ceu­ti­cal man­u­fac­tur­ers,” says John McK­eon, CEO of Gal­larus. “The new solu­tion deliv­ers expo­nen­tial ben­e­fits in the form of ROI, cost-sav­ing, qual­i­ty enhance­ment, and OEE efficiencies.”

The K600G is capa­ble of print­ing at speeds of up to 75 metres per minute and print widths range from a sin­gle print mod­ule, cov­er­ing 108mm (4.25”), up to sev­en dual print mod­ules with a com­bined width of 782mm (30.81”). The smart i‑Tech Stitch­Link micro-motor con­troller tech­nol­o­gy enables accu­rate print head align­ment and image stitch­ing to achieve seam­less print­ing across a full web print width.

With its rev­o­lu­tion­ary i‑Tech Clean­Cap, the K600G cleans the print heads when not in oper­a­tion, leav­ing them wiped and capped, ready for the next use. This removes the need for dai­ly print head clean­ing, pro­tects the print heads from block­age and dam­age, and reduces the need for main­te­nance. i‑Tech Act­i­Flow ensures the ink is always mov­ing around the print head. This degasses the ink, pre­vent­ing the for­ma­tion of air bub­bles that can impact noz­zle per­for­mance and increase the risk of prod­uct rejects. 

 “When we set out to devel­op the K600G we want­ed to devel­op a future-proof solu­tion that would meet the cur­rent needs of phar­ma­ceu­ti­cal man­u­fac­tur­ers, and allow them to adapt more eas­i­ly to chang­ing mar­ket trends and leg­isla­tive require­ments,” says Watzke. “The result is a strong and reli­able solu­tion that helps to ensure com­pli­ance and patient safe­ty while allow­ing man­u­fac­tur­ers to remain agile. When it comes to phar­ma­ceu­ti­cal man­u­fac­tur­ing, the K600G is the solu­tion of choice, now, and in the future,” he concludes. 

For more infor­ma­tion on the K600G please vis­it https://bit.ly/2HwRcBE