中文When a family-run trade shop that has survived nearly four decades of flexographic evolution decides to replace its plate imaging backbone, the industry pays attention. Ankit Graphics, the Ahmedabad-based flexo pre-press trade house, has invested in Esko CDI Crystal Quartz technology in the 4260 format — a move aimed squarely at expanding its capabilities in wide-web flexible packaging, a segment where demand for flexographic printing continues to grow.
The company has been in the flexo plate-making business since 1987, weathering every major transition the industry has thrown at prepress: from analog film to digital CtP, from conventional dots to flat-top screening, and now into fully automated, optics-free plate imaging. Management sees the Quartz investment as another step in a long-standing approach of adopting new technologies to improve plate quality and printing performance.
Why Quartz, Why Now
“Ankit Graphics has been in the flexo plate-making trade for nearly four decades, with a consistent focus on adopting new technologies,” said Ankit Darji. He added that his decision to invest in the Quartz platform followed several months of evaluation, including a visit to Germany to gain a closer understanding of the technology’s development.
That due diligence matters because Quartz represents a meaningful departure from conventional plate imaging. Traditional CDI workflows depend on LAMS — a laser-ablatable mask layer coated onto the photopolymer plate. Quartz removes that consumable entirely, imaging the plate directly and, in doing so, addressing several limitations associated with conventional LAMS plate imaging. According to Darji, the technology offers opportunities to improve flexographic reproduction and printing performance while cutting a recurring material cost from the production economics.
For a trade shop, LAMS elimination has a second-order benefit: fewer consumable variables means fewer sources of plate-to-plate variation. Customers evaluating prepress partners increasingly audit consistency, not just quality, and an imaging system that removes a whole class of process variation strengthens that pitch.
The 42 x 60-Inch Logic
The choice of the 42 x 60-inch (4260) format was guided by the company’s existing production setup and the requirements of its customer base. “The 42 x 60 format offers considerable versatility, covering a wide range of applications, particularly in wide-web packaging, where most jobs can be accommodated within our existing setup,” Darji said.
The format decision reflects a pragmatic reading of the market. Wide-web flexible packaging presses dominate India’s food, personal care and home care packaging output, and the majority of their plate requirements fit comfortably within 42 x 60 inches. Rather than over-buying format for a handful of outlier jobs, Ankit Graphics is matching capacity to the work that actually crosses its counter — the same discipline that has kept the business profitable through multiple technology cycles.
Flexo’s Expanding Share
The investment also reflects the company’s focus on the flexible packaging market, where flexographic printing is gaining ground against gravure. Shorter run lengths, faster artwork turnaround and sustainability pressures have shifted economics toward flexo across a growing range of categories. The company expects the combination of Quartz imaging and advanced screening algorithms to help it deliver the reproduction quality, print definition and solid ink density sought by packaging converters and brand owners.
For converters, the practical difference shows up in highlights and fine type — the areas where gravure historically held the advantage. Better imaging precision and modern screening close that gap, and trade shops able to demonstrate it become strategic partners in converters’ efforts to move work from gravure to flexo.
Technology as a Growth Engine
Darji, who has been associated with the family-run business for 18 years, views technology adoption as an important contributor to its commercial progress. “Each technology upgrade has contributed to our business growth and sales. Plate-making has become a passion for us, and we expect the Esko Quartz ecosystem to offer a similar competitive edge, building on the benefits of our previous investments,” he said.
Ahmedabad’s prepress cluster has produced several successful trade shops serving India’s western packaging belt, and Ankit Graphics’ willingness to keep investing keeps it in that leading group. As India’s flexible packaging converters add capacity and demand finer print quality, the shops behind the plates are the ones enabling it — and Ankit Graphics has just made its position clear for the next cycle.
The wider market context supports the timing. India’s flexible packaging converters have been upgrading presses and expanding capacities steadily, and the prepress layer has become the quality bottleneck in several categories: as press speeds rise and brand artwork grows more intricate, plate quality determines whether the investment upstream actually shows on shelf. Trade shops that modernize their imaging keep that bottleneck open; those that delay watch their customers drift to better-equipped competitors — often in the same city.
Quartz’s LAMS-free workflow also brings workflow and environmental benefits that matter to a high-volume trade operation. Removing the mask-layer consumable simplifies inventory, eliminates a production step prone to handling variation, and reduces waste per plate. For a business imaging thousands of square meters of photopolymer annually, those incremental gains compound into a meaningful cost and consistency advantage — which is ultimately how technology investments like this one pay for themselves.
The competitive read for Ahmedabad’s prepress cluster is equally clear. With multiple successful trade shops serving the same western-India packaging belt, differentiation now depends on imaging generation and process discipline rather than price alone. Ankit Graphics’ move to Quartz raises the local quality bar and forces a response from peers — a dynamic that, over time, lifts the capabilities available to every converter in the region.
Source: thepackman.in
