PrePRESS Solutions' Panther Remote Leaps Ahead in Productive Distributed Imagesetting.

EAST HANOVER, N.J.--(BUSINESS WIRE)--Jan. 26, 1996-- PrePRESS SOLUTIONS today introduced remote printing capabilities for their widely - acclaimed Panther RIP - a solution specifically engineered to solve some of the biggest problems in remote printing today: missing graphics, incorrect fonts, and the desire for greater control and responsibility by the content creator.

"We recognized many of the benefits of remote printing issues long ago," explained Phil Rose, PrePRESS' Product Marketing Manager. "As a matter of fact, the capability to perform remote printing was engineered into the Panther RIP from the outset. What was missing, and is just now becoming available, were the very demanding telecommunications technologies essential to support this application. With the reliability of the newer higher-speed modems, and the declining price and increased availability of ISDN connections, PrePRESS' foresight has resulted in a system that will give our customers a tremendous advantage."

There are several potential applications for PrePRESS' remote printing capabilities:

o Content creators - magazine and catalog publishers, for example - want absolute control over the pages in the publication. Remote printing let's them create electronic files in the office, but relegate the imagesetting to another location - they increase control, reduce capital expenditure, and lower charges from the printer or service bureau because jobs run first time, every time.

o Multiple-site printing operations - a chain of small - circulation newspapers, for example - want to establish one central production site to cut duplicated overhead, but transmitting PostScript files or application documents causes problems with missing fonts and other PostScript errors. Since the document is RIPed at the creation site, there are no time-consuming font problems or other PostScript errors at the imagesetting site.

o Many publishers can lower printing costs by sending electronic files to a large commercial printers, but are typically concerned about PostScript compatibility and the high cost of excessive RIP times. PrePRESS' remote printing solution eliminates those concerns by placing PostScript RIPing at the publishers site, and virtually eliminating the RIP time at the imagesetting location.

In PrePRESS' setup the content creator - artist, editor, publisher, etc. - places a Panther RIP right in their office. They can configure that RIP to have any of the options available to a full imagesetting system - high-quality ESCOR screening, Kanji font capabilities, and so on. When they're ready to prepare a page for remote printing, the completed document is sent to the Panther RIP which creates a compact, easy to transmit pre-RIPed file. This file is then transmitted, using any of a variety of techniques, to the imagesetting site for output on film, paper, or plate material with a Panther Family Imagesetting System. The RIP at the remote site is not processing PostScript files, so there are no concerns about missing fonts, incorrect spot functions, wrong printer description files, or any of the other messy complications that currently plague commercial printers and PostScript service bureaus. Because the file was created by another Panther RIP, it doesn't need to be RIPed again - it's sent directly to the imagesetter and printed at full recorder speed.

"We have been committed to providing solutions to the global graphic arts community that increase productivity, and are cost effective," said Mike Dillon, Vice-President for PrePRESS. "The remote printing capability of the Panther RIP, just like many other features in the Panther Family, is built-in productivity at no extra charge. Our end users employ a variety of productivity- boosting features, settings, and options available within the Panther Family to create individualized workflow patterns. That, quite simply, is what makes PrePRESS the only logical choice."

The Panther Family of Imagesetting Systems, centered around the highly-productive Panther RIP, includes the Panther and PantherPlus(TM) for high-speed, high-quality film production, the Panther Color Printer for dye-sublimation color output, the PantherPro(TM) series for extremely high-speed, high-quality output, and the PantherPlate(TM) series for computer-to-plate and cut-to-length film applications. PrePRESS' ESCOR-II(TM) super- cell, and ESCOR-FM(TM) stochastic, screening technologies are options to all Panther RIP based systems. In addition the Panther RIP can provide a link to the HP DesignJet 750C plotter for proofing as well as final output in large-format, plain-paper applications.

PrePRESS SOLUTIONS, located in East Hanover, New Jersey, USA, is an innovative manufacturing and distribution company dedicated to providing to the global prepress community solutions based on the broadest array of productivity-boosting products and related services, including installation, training, maintenance, and helpline capabilities, at the lowest possible prices. For further information on any of PrePRESS' products, call [phone], ext. 1 or [phone], ext. 6100.

ESCOR II, ESCOR-FM, PrePRESS SOLUTIONS, Panther, PantherPlus, and PantherPro are trademarks of Prepress Solutions, Inc. and/or an affiliated company.

PostScript is a trademark of Adobe Systems Incorporated, which may be registered in certain jurisdictions.

Macintosh is a registered trademark and Power Macintosh is a trademark of Apple Computer, Inc.

UNIX is a registered trademark in the United States and other countries licensed exclusively through X/Open Company, Ltd.

CONTACT: PrePress Solutions Inc.

Philip C. Rose

Product Marketing Manager

[phone] or [phone], ext. 7400

CIS: 74504,634; AOL: PhilRose

Internet: [e-mail]

WWW: http://www.prepress.pps.com