Showing for the first time at Drupa, the booklet system has been developed with a cutter supplied by Kern and a binder supplied by Ibis.

The K630i currently being shown on Domino’s stand will be shipped to Ashford’s Hampshire premises after the show.

Ashford customer services director Eddi Oliver said: “The quality that we are seeing out of the machine is great and it is a solution that we feel we are already familiar with so it kind of makes sense for us to go for it. Given the way the market is going with short-run book printing, this is exactly what we are keen to develop.”

The booklet system delivers both stitched and glued booklets, printing at 7,000bph at speeds of up to 150m/min for 600x300dpi. However, the Ashford configuration is for perfect-bound books. 

Domino’s director of digital printing solutions Philip Easton said: “This follows on with our strategy that we were developing around 2009 where we rebranded the Domino business as digital printing solutions.” 

Domino is also showing on its stand its K600i sheetfed digital printheads and N610i digital label press.

Domino product manager Bryan Palphreyman said the company is currently working with Ashford to create another total booklet solution, which should be on the market within about a year.

He said: “We see the book sector as a very good market to go into and Ashford have been fantastic to work with, and there is a lot of synergy between the two companies. We’re a very open company and I think we will both learn how to go forward.”

Ashford Colour Press is equipped with litho, inkjet and machine-fed facilities. It mainly produces books for the education sector. The 128-staff company carries out all its work in-house, and has a turnover of £11.5m.