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Ever-improving technology will reduce costs by conserving everything from floorspace to full-time employees, SuperConference post-press segment panelists said Tuesday.
Hot new technology includes "The Bundler" from GMA Inc. Technology Director Darrell E. Pav said the single machine promises to bring together the decades-old process of stacking, bundling and tying. He said the machine is "99.99 plus, plus" accurate, can cut staffing from two-to-three people to one-half position and saves 200 square feet of line space.
VIT Information Technology will soon offer virtual reality training packages for all mailroom operations. Senior research scientist Matti Kuusisto said the programs go beyond simulation to help employees learn systems, from the full mailroom to a single machine or line position.
Craftsman Newspaper Production Systems Vice President Roger Miller reviewed European company Schur Packaging Systems' versatile Winrob Palletizer. Introduced in October at IFRA98, the product has been refined and can be delivered with 14 weeks of lead time.
Rick Ruffino, a consultant and vice president of technology for the Bergen Record in Hackensack, N.J., reviewed how a three-year process brought to reality the first Enterprise Management System in North America. EMS reduced the paper's reliance on 49 different software systems to a handful. More importantly, he said, it unites newspaper and broadcast holdings -- including post-press, human resources and other diverse elements -- into a single information-technology system.
--by Bob Sims