Precision slashes short job costs with Oneflow

Published on 22 Nov 2010

Precision has launched Oneflow, a software platform that cost-effectively process ultra-short-run print work – Print Week article 12th November 2010 by Barney Cox.

The system, which cost £200,000 to develop, bridges the gap between customer facing tools such as web-to-print and e-procurement platforms and internal administration, production and despatch systems, slashing the cost of order processing, tracking and scheduling.

“Oneflow is a back-end tool to process even the most tricky job down to a run length of one,” said managing director Gary Peeling. “It brings a production line mentality to print.”

Developing the system enabled us to secure a £1.5m per year contract, in a sector that is growing 50% year-on-year.

“It’s the first growth market in printing that I’ve known for a long time,” said Gary.

Initially developed for a photo products client, we are rolling it out for marketing collateral to enable quick print responses to clients’ online activity. For example following up an online or email enquiry with a personalised brochure printed and despatched immediately.

“This will encourage greater use of print by enabling small volumes to be produced cost-effectively in large quantities,” said Gary.

Having rolled the system out to our digital division we are developing it to handle litho work.

The system is based around XML and JDF data formats, with the software able to sort jobs by priority and to batch similar items to reduce the need to reset equipment for different products. Barcodes are used to identify jobs in production, and it is possible to consolidate different items from the same job for despatch to improve customer service and reduce delivery costs.