German machinery manufacturer Hinterkopf GmbH is positioning dry offset, HD-Print and digital printing as a unified technology portfolio for the decoration of tubes, cans and other cylindrical hollow bodies, arguing that converters no longer need to choose between print quality, efficiency and flexibility.
Dry offset remains the company's high-volume workhorse, offering multi-colour printing with strong opacity and throughput for FMCG, cosmetics and pharmaceutical applications.
HD-Print, Hinterkopf's waterless offset variant with CMYK capability, bridges the gap between traditional offset and photorealistic reproduction by running four CMYK units in tandem with up to five conventional spot-colour units within a single hybrid process.
Crucially, existing dry offset units can be retrofitted to HD-Print specification, reducing capital expenditure for converters looking to upgrade without replacing installed equipment.
Digital printing rounds out the offer with inkjet-based, non-contact decoration suited to short runs, variable data printing and late-stage design changes down to batch size one.
Across the three technologies, the key differentiators break down as follows: dry offset leads on productivity and cost efficiency at volume; HD-Print offers photorealistic CMYK output combined with medium-to-high reconfigurability and retrofitability; digital printing provides the greatest flexibility and is the only process capable of variable data applications, though at medium productivity and higher per-unit cost at scale. All three support full 360-degree decoration.
Alexander Hinterkopf, managing director and owner of Hinterkopf GmbH, summarised the company's positioning: "Three technologies. One partner. Maximum creative freedom."
