The sleek, modern four-story 25,000-sq.-m. C&C Joint Printing is located in the Beijing Economic-Technological Development Area.
During PW’s visit in June, its immaculate production floor was packed with pallets of semi-finished and finished products as far as the eye could see. Clean and green is the philosophy driving the processes and systems that made this facility one of the first enterprises to obtain China’s environmental labeling certificate back in 2011. Its centralized ink and water supply and its wastewater and gas treatment systems, for instance, are as much about optimizing energy and resource consumption as they are about improving the work environment.
But the plant’s star attraction is undeniably the brand-new Müller Martini Diamant MC 60 hardcover book line. The first of its kind to be installed in Asia, this fully automated line stretches 172 meters (instead of the conventional 50 meters) and offers a dozen different processes, including gluing, cutting, ribbonwrapping, shell-covering, and protective packaging.
“The entire line has four sets of visual inspection devices to detect the front and back of a book block, book cover, and the backing paper, with three glue pots offering four different gluing methods,” says sales manager Jessica Hu, adding that the line is capable of handling oversized formats up to 305- mm in width and 380-mm in height, with an auto-loading capacity of 50 books per minute.
C&C Beijing's range of services includes adding a QR code-based anticounterfeiting solution for each book and packed carton. “With the QR code, aside from product track-and-trace, publishers can now explore the possibilities of personalizing supplementary digital content as well as devising targeted promotional activities for their customers,” adds Hu.
C&C Beijing started its operations by printing magazines and periodicals for the domestic market about 22 years ago. Then it expanded to include textbooks and educational materials. Last year, nearly 29% of its total sales came from exports. “One of the largest projects we received covered 205 titles, 14.98 million copies of PUR-adhesive bound books, and 360 shipping containers bound for Ethiopia,” adds Hu, pointing out that C&C Beijing, Shanghai, and Shenzhen facilities collaborated to fulfill the $13 million contract within 75 days.
