Wifag-Polytype Holding subsidiary Polytype SA, which makes systems for printing tubes, cups and cans, is to distribute the platesetters of fellow Swiss company Lüscher.

A statement by Daniel Wider and Alain Berset, who head the company’s cup and tube decoration business units, says the global distribution partnership will greatly extend the strategic areas of activity of both companies.

The partnership will round off Polytype’s product portfolio and develop into a full-range supplier. Customers can now count on outstanding support not just for their standard requirements but also for highly specific, complex tasks in the fields of blockmaking and print form production. “This will not only lead to considerable cost savings but will also massively increase our customers‘ flexibility,” Wider and Berset say.

The partnership will enable Lüscher to “greatly expand its market for plate CTP systems thanks to the use of new, pioneering imaging technology”, the company says, giving customers access to unique, hybrid systems to image print forms such as dry offset, offset, and flexographic plates, rotation and flat screens.

Lüscher chief operating officer Anton Tanner says Polytype SA is an “exceptionally well-established partner” whose international market leadership will open up long-term opportunities.

Lüscher’s international distribution is through its own sales companies in Germany, Italy, Spain, France and Hong Kong, as well as sales offices in England, Austria and China. Worldwide the company works with sales partners in over 60 countries.

Wifag-Polytype Holdings also owns newspaper press makers WIFGA and Solna.