The HP PrintOS mobile application
HP will launch PrintOS at drupa, a new end-to-end cloud-based workflow platform. By Barney Cox at drupa media week in Düsseldorf.
At the heart of PrintOS are three aims: to maximise the productivity of equipment, to simplify production and to facilitate innovation, collaboration and growth, according to HP graphic solutions business director Simon Lewis.
‘There has been a massive change in printing technology over the past 20 years but not in the way printers run their operations,’ said Mr Lewis. ‘That means that they spend so much time fire fighting that they don’t have time to grow their businesses and re-invent themselves.’
The cloud-based system will be available to any HP customer with a current service contract; the initial target will be Indigo, PageWide, Latex and Scitex wide-format customers.
‘It will offer breakthrough cost of ownership,’ said Mr Lewis. ‘Any HP customer can have a free PrintOS account with unlimited users.’
He added, ‘We are in this to drive customer success, not to build a big cloud business.’
HP graphic solutions business director, Simon Lewis
Initially driving HP products, in time the firm will open it up to drive other digital and analogue devices and will publish APIs to enable open integration. The first non HP products to be supported are the Pageflex Pando campaign management system and Pressero Aleyant web to print (which has just been taken on in Europe by Fujifilm).
The system can be bolstered by the addition of apps for specific purposes. The first two apps Box and Siteflow, which are for job receipt and pre-press and shopfloor management respectively are based on OneFlow, the software initially developed by London-based Precision Printing to drive its own systems. HP has become the exclusive global sales channel for OneFlow products. HP promises to have at least 10 apps available by drupa.
Field-testing of PrintOS began last summer and to date there are 40 sites using it to drive a total of 100 presses. One of those sites is Sheffield-based ProCo.
‘PrintOS offers anytime, anywhere access, enabling more visibility into our business,’ said ProCo production director Graeme Parry.
