Benny Landa, chairman and chief executive officer of Landa Corporation has revealed a €100m financing agreement with speciality chemicals Group ALTANA and confirmed his Nanographic Printing Presses will come to market in the second half of 2015. “The challenges ahead of us are ramping up, we have to complete the engineering, scale up the manufacturing of the inks and printing presses, and of course increase the size of our organisation and infrastructure,” says Landa, chairman and CEO of Landa Corporation.
He continues: “So all of that of course requires substantial capital. It is not a matter of economies of scale, so much as creating the infrastructure for delivering, because it is not trivial to manufacture these 30 tonne machines, or vast amounts of NanoInk. You have to build factories, train people, and hire engineers. All of that is a major draw on resources.
“After Beta testing we will be coming to market in the latter half of 2015, it depends how long it takes and how successful it is. So Beta in the first half of 2015 and the second half of 2015 shipping production units.”
Landa revealed that for the past ten years he has been funding Landa Digital Printing on his own. He adds that it was the response to his Nanographic Printing Presses and NanoInk technology at Drupa 2012 —which saw massive orders—that made it clear to the serial entrepreneur that the size of this business sector is not something, ‘one individual can finance’.
Landa continues, outlining the place that ALTANA will play in bringing his revolutionary technology to market: “So, we decided to raise financing to help fund the engineering, scale up, manufacturing infrastructure, and our factory. “ALTANA actually came across us as they had quite independently identified digital printing as one of their main strategic directions for the company. So we were delighted with this serendipity, as ALTANA for us means not having to deal with a group of investors and investor relations. Where as in ALTANA’s case, they are not only knowledgeable about the business, they are in the market. Of their four divisions three are in print-related businesses.”
Dr. Matthias L. Wolfgruber, chief executive officer, ALTANA AG, believes Landa’s technology is ‘game changing’ “We are extremely excited to be partnering with an industry visionary like Benny Landa. We speak the same language in terms of innovation,” says Dr. Matthias L. Wolfgruber, chief executive officer, ALTANA AG. He adds: “I am confident that we are investing in a game-changing technology that can enable the printing industry to thrive in the 21st century and help our customers position themselves well for the future.”
Landa adds: “We see our alliance with the ALTANA Group as a key milestone for our company and a strong vote of confidence in our mission to bring digital printing to mainstream commercial, packaging and publishing markets. ALTANA brings a wealth of relevant industry and market experience as well as worldwide manufacturing expertise, which will be of great value as we expand our presence globally.”
