Asahi Photoproducts recently celebrated its 40 Year
Anniversary of the company at a Conference for its employees. Thirty Asahi representatives from nine
countries spent two days in Athens, Greece meeting their counterparts and
Senior Management team from Japan. The
conference reflected on the milestones of the past 40 years and brought the
team together to plan the future growth and innovation strategy of the
organisation.
Asahi Photoproducts is a leader in the production of
photopolymer plates for the flexographic printing industry. The company was a
world pioneer in the development of photopolymer plate technology, launching a
water washable photopolymer APR plate & plate making system in 1971 in
Japan. Subsequently launched in Europe
1973, the company has had a proud history of technical innovation and service
excellence over the past 40 years.
Dr. Dieter Niederstadt, Technical Marketing Manager,
comments, “Asahi Photoproducts is totally dedicated to supporting our
customers. From our Japanese cultural
roots, we understand the importance of service, as well as great product
solutions. ‘Omotenashi’ in Japanese
literally means to “entertain guests wholeheartedly”. For our business we translate this meaning in
completely understanding our customers’ needs and requirements to ensure that
our customers feel that they have a high level of satisfaction and delight in
everything we do.
“The Asahi AWP plate solution is a great example of our
belief in ‘Omotenashi’. We took time to
listen to our customers and we understood that a breakthrough technology was
needed to enable the industry to improve its pressroom efficiencies; keeping
the printing press uptime high by reducing the plate cleaning intervals, was
key to this step. Working with the scientists at our Japanese Parent Company to
engineer our own polymers, Asahi is delivering the AWP water washable plate
technology to market to great success.”
The conference was an opportunity for the company to look
back at its history – from pioneering the first photopolymer plate in 1971 and
delivering the world’s first solid plate AFP and plate making system AFP1500
consist of “both side exposure method” and “germicidal light finishing post
exposure method” in 1984 which became de factor technology through this industry,
to today’s pioneering of “Pinning top” technology to control surface energy on
plates for better press performance.
Dr. Niederstadt continued: “By looking at our past successes
and understanding that the voice of the customer is core to everything we do,
we have learned a lot about what will deliver us success going forward.”
