Konica Minolta has launched a Professional Print Division in Europe that has Charles Lissenburg in a new role of General Manager. He will be at the helm of the teams that will focus on providing  products and solutions leading to business efficiency and value improvement for commercial and industrial printing customers.

This new division has been created to reflect the growing importance of the industrial and commercial printing sectors as Konica Minolta becomes more customer focused and moves more into marketing, software and cross-media services to take print applications on to a new level.

Lissenburg has moved from Nuance Communications where he was Senior Vice President of Worldwide Sales, Imaging for three years. Prior to that, he was with EFI for 14 years where he was latterly Vice President, Worldwide OEM Sales.

Lissenburg comments, “There are huge new opportunities within industrial and commercial printing markets which we seek to capitalise on. As we continue to grow our unique approaches into the high-end commercial print and industrial markets, it is key that we provide customers with insight and business tools to enable them to capture new market opportunities. The Professional Print Division aims to expand its digital printing business by leveraging its technologies to meet the need for high-mix, small-quantity variable production and short lead times, and by offering solutions to enhance printing operation efficiency.”

Over the past few years, Konica Minolta has made huge moves into industrial markets with the launch of its AccurioJet KM-1 UV inkjet sheetfed press and bizhub PRESS C71cf on-demand label printer as well as other important developments in packaging and professional printing sectors.

Konica Minolta has a stated aim of replicating its success in the mid-production colour printing sector to gain leadership in the industrial printing market. Key industrial applications such as label and packaging are the focus of Konica Minolta’s research, as evidenced by its development of new printing technology and partnerships with companies such as MGI Digital Technology.

Indy Nakagawa, president of Konica Minolta Business Solutions Europe GmbH, says, “Given Konica Minolta’s heritage of being a world leader in Industrial Printing based on our outstanding inkjet technology which make us #1 in the textile market as well as a leading manufacturer for inkjet heads, we are now further expanding into industrial printing solutions for our professional print business in Europe. The new division has been established to further support these with dedicated knowledge, expertise and leading-edge solutions. We welcome Charles as he brings his considerable industry expertise to what is an exciting new opportunity in a fast-moving market.”