Automation has been implemented in most manufacturing environments for more than a decade, providing efficiencies and cost reductions. Locally, printers have been slow to take up workflow automation to take advantage of these high-value efficiencies.
Printers can benefit significantly from automating workflows in their print business, which:
- significantly reduces errors that can creep into manual, repetitive tasks
- dramatically reduces time and labour required to complete jobs
- frees up staff to contribute in other high-value areas of the business
- decreases turnaround times for clients while increasing volumes and margins
- delivers other tangible benefits to clientele.
How automation delivers benefits
Commercial printers around the world have used automation to help grow their businesses by focusing on these key areas:
- automating the process of job splitting and prepress to save hours of manual work
- letting customers order online through simple web-based interfaces with 24/7 access
- automating online order workflows that trigger prepress, printing, finishing, and shipping processes
- automating invoicing and payment processing, improving cash flow and freeing up valuable time and resources.
You can configure your automation software to manage job ticketing and monitor device status in real-time, so if there is an issue, you can address it before it starts to affect your customers.
What’s stopping you from doing this already?
The cost and complexity of implementing automated workflows can seem daunting for many printers. Furthermore, if you have invested heavily in legacy systems, have a mixed-vendor environment, or deal with highly varied workflows with multiple entry points, the idea of automating these processes might seem too complex for one automated solution.
Some printers, long accustomed to having full control over every job, see no reason to automate these manual processes.
However, if you haven’t considered workflow automation for some time now, it might be time to reconsider.
How AccurioPro Solutions can help
Konica Minolta’s AccurioPro solutions help printers reach new levels of efficiencies, driving greater print production and expanding print capability.
Our prepress and print automation software suite, AccurioPro Flux, has been designed to cater for a wide range of requirements, with three tiered levels available. All three levels enable automated workflow tasks and centralise control of the print workflow system so your business can be more efficient.
AccurioPro Flux Ultimate is our most sophisticated application as it offers web submission, letting print businesses:
- order online by uploading and previewing their jobs
- confirm automatically that the files are printable with correct resolution, embedded fonts, and transparencies
- receive an instant online quotation for the job via automatic calculations based on the job’s parameters
- pay online for the job and track its status throughout the process.
Meanwhile, you retain full control over all processes even as they’re automatically executed using AccurioPro Flux.
With AccurioPro solutions, workflow automation delivers greater process efficiency, saving valuable time and money, and, at the same time, increasing volumes and ultimately margins.
To find out more about our workflow solutions and how Konica Minolta can fully integrate workflow automation into your existing print process, contact us today.
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