Xeikon Café Europe 2019, scheduled for March 26-28 in Antwerp, Belgium, brings back its educational Academy. Providing a thorough look at revenue-generating opportunities from both a business as well as a technology perspective, the Academy program comprises a series of parallel sessions.

The Business Talks will help attendees acquire knowledge and insights on business opportunities, while the practical Tech Talks focus on the technical characteristics of a wide variety of end-use applications. Each will include or be followed by a technology demo at one of the presses running a live, relevant end-use application based on the contents of the session. An overview of all Academy sessions can be found below or is available in the Xeikon Café event app. To install the Xeikon Café app, click here or simply download the Eventmobi app at the iTunes store or at Google Play and enter the code ‘xceurope’.

“Xeikon Café Academy provides a valuable learning opportunity for event attendees,” explains Danny Mertens of Xeikon Café. “The goal is to provide them with practical info they can take back home to develop new business opportunities and applications that bring added value for their customers. Both Business Talks and Tech Talks also showcase the value brought to market by close collaboration among all Xeikon Café partners, each sharing technical expertise that results in the whole being greater than the sum of its parts. On top of that, by combining the Academy sessions with an on-the-spot demo, attendees get the level of detail needed to take actionable ideas back to their businesses.”

In addition to the highly educational content in the Academy, there is also the Xeikon Café Conference taking place each morning and offering thought leadership content from a variety of brands and printing professionals, including Keynote Trend Researcher Aljan De Boer, DS Smith, Continental Foods, Tough Crowd, Eurocod, Leaderform and Tapecon.

Academy program details:

Business Talks

• Navigating through the digital opportunity: For visitors considering adding digital to their labels and packaging production portfolio or looking to increase the amount of digital technology they now have. This session explores a number of opportunities for business growth enabled by digital.
• Perfecting the Digital and Flexo match: This session helps visitors decide when it is more efficient to use digital over flexo or offset, and provide insights as to how digital production can improve the profitability of a conventional print business and help to acquire more customers.
• Choosing the right print technology: drivers for success: Most label converters understand the variety of digital print technologies available on the market today, but are they also aware of the specific characteristics and benefits of each? This session offers a technology-agnostic approach to choosing the most optimal technology.
• Next-level digital production goals: how can you reach yours?: This is an expert session in which many tips & tricks are shared on how to maximise digital production; continuously improve operations by stripping out more time, waste and cost; and ultimately increase margins and service levels.

• Unravelling the complexity of digital in-mold labels: This technical session is dedicated to unravelling the mystery and complexity around high-impact in-mould labels and details how digital production can be implemented as a complement to conventional printing.
• When food safety and quality matters: dry toner cost application gains: Presenters will outline the benefits of dry toner EP (electrophotography) digital production from a technological point of view, as well as list the specific requirements for producing labels for food, beverage, wine, spirits and pharma applications, which all come with their very own aesthetic and functional demands.
• Cost application benefits of UV inkjet: get ahead with all you need to know: This session delves into UV inkjet technology to answer any questions about production requirements and costs, specifically related to applications for household, industrial, durables and health & beauty.
• Showcase of a hybrid solution for short-run carton label production: Digital production helps meet brand challenges to address seasonality and changing market demands. It is even more valuable when short-run production of a variety of label and carton packages is combined in one-run thanks to smart, automated workflow processes.
• Too hot to handle? How to unleash unlimited advertising on paper cups: In this session, visitors get the technical basics on how a paper cup is made and learn how to leverage their digital print equipment to unleash unlimited possibilities for advertising on paper cups, while ensuring food safety compliance.
• Pouches, an opportunity beyond your labels: One of the fastest growing flexible packaging types, stand-up pouches are often perceived as premium packaging. Digital production allows label printers and converters to offer a unique service and benefit from high quality, cost-effective lower volumes and shorter lead times.
• How smooth is your operation? Get business smart with end-2-end production: A must-attend session for any printer looking to leverage its digital production set-up for optimum business results. Experts will discuss in-depth the configuration of a true end-to-end digital label production that integrates prepress, print, converting and quality control.
• Hot right now: capitalize on digital heat transfer labels that stick: Whether for promotional items or plastic containers, digital heat transfer decoration can open new business doors. This session details how to leverage digital production for any heat transfer application, and how to deliver them faster and with much higher quality.
• The role of the designer in a successful packaging label workflow: A not-to-be-missed session for anyone involved in prepress. For a workflow to be efficient and effective, the role of the designer responsible for the graphics, images, layout and final job file, is of undeniable importance. This session discusses the main pain points and technical challenges, and how to deal with them.
• The new normal in digital colour management: Increasing demand of global brands for colour equity across geographies and substrates, makes it ever more challenging for flexo label printers to pixel-perfect match brand & Pantone colours. This session has the answer how to reliably meet these colour demands.
• Staying on top of new food safety regulations (session only on Wed March 27): Food safety is of the utmost importance if you are producing labels or packaging for any kind of food product. This session provides insights on the food safety aspects across all printing technologies, while providing an update of new and emerging regulations;