NEWSLETTER Q4/2017

2017: A New Beginning

Jan Franz Allerkamp, Managing Director

2017 was a year for new beginnings. Following the acquisition of the Nano-Metallography technology from Landa in February, ACTEGA Metal Print (AMP) was officially launched in March 2017 with myself as Managing Director and Volker Krebs as our CTO.

Our mission is to deliver a sustainable technology for metallization graphics that saves a significant amount of material, costs, and production time compared to today’s conventional processes. With a clear and focused timeline to launch our technology—now called ECOLEAF—at drupa 2020. We have a very aggressive, yet very achievable schedule. Over the next two years, we will complete the technology and product development, transforming it from a technology demonstration to a sustainable, mainstream solution that will supplant foil transfer for labels.

We have already setup a state-of-the-art chemical lab and office facilities in Lehrte near Hanover, Germany where we are hard at work refining the core technology and optimizing it to work using ALTANA materials. The technology and know-how transfer will continue in an ongoing basis with Landa Labs and we will be closely cooperating until we commercially launch ECOLEAF. 

We are making excellent progress and we have started to intensely communicate with our customers to define the requirements of the commercial ECOLEAF product.

A Growing Team

Jan Franz Allerkamp, Managing Director

It’s hard to believe that in March 2017 AMP was just a two-man team. Today we have already grown to 11 people thanks to some very active recruiting and a strong company vision to help make print greener. Before starting AMP with Volker Krebs, I was in various management positions at ALTANA for the last eight years.

We have successfully recruited some of the “best of the best”, with backgrounds ranging from chemistry and mechanical engineering to printing, finance, business administration and management. I am joined by the following people on AMP’s leadership team:

Volker Krebs, CTO
Krebs was previously the Segment Manager at ACTEGA Terra and has been with the ALTANA group for 9 years. He is a true industry veteran with more than 25 years’ experience in the printing and packaging industry.

Dr. Matthias Eul, Head of R&D Chemistry
Dr. Matthias Eul, Head of R&D ChemistryEul has been with ALTANA for 5 years and was previously the Head of R&D at ALTANA Printed Electronics.

Andreas Ihme, Head of R&D Mechanical Engineering
Ihme joined AMP in October with more than 19 years of experience in the printing industry. He was previously the Division Manager Process Engineering R&D at Windmöller & Hölscher, a leading manufacturer of flexographic and gravure printing presses.

Oliver Marx, Head of New Business Development
Marx has spent the last 8 years at ALTANA and most recently served as the Manager, Corporate Development and M&A

Tzipi Netz, Products Strategy Manager
Netz came to AMP in August from Landa Labs where she was the Products Strategy Manager. She is a 25-year veteran of the printing industry and spent many years in a variety of roles at HP Indigo.

Torsten Uhlig, Head of Application Department
Torsten Uhlig, Head of Application DUhlig joined AMP in June and has more than 30 years’ experience in the printing industry. Before joining AMP, he was the owner of a consultancy company for the printing industry department.

We know from experience that potentially market-changing innovation takes time. ALTANA and ACTEGA Metal Print have the required know-how, technologies and the patience to get things right. We have assembled a fantastic team and we are well on our way!

ACTEGA Metal Print @ Labelexpo 2017

Volker Krebs, CTO 

ACTEGA Metal Print presented its technology and its latest samples at Labelexpo 2017, the world’s largest event for the labels and packaging industry. Held from 29 September to 2 October in Brussels, the show was very well attended and provided an excellent opportunity to update our customers and the worldwide label printing community about our ECOLEAF technology.

We had many visitors from all over the world and met with senior management of leading global companies in the label industry. Famous name brands were also very interested to learn about our ECOLEAF technology and we received extremely positive feedback on our results to-date. 

We also had the opportunity to meet with large press manufacturers to discuss the integration of our technology on their machines. All in all, the meetings were very promising, and we look forward to Labelexpo 2019 to present and demonstrate a well-developed, nearly commercial version of our technology.

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