Jul 11, 2011. /Lesprom Network/. Kingston Carton has placed an order with manroland GB for a six-colour ROLAND 700 LV + coater DirectDrive press. The sale will be installed at 94 year-old privately-owned packaging print operation this summer and will provide it with the flexibility to grow market share in the highly competitive on-demand and mirco-run sectors of the food and healthcare packaging industries, as the company said in a press release received by Lesprom Network. Says Arend Buitendam, Managing Director, Kingston Carton: "With greater demand for more specialised packaging, quicker make-readies and lower print runs becoming the accepted norm in our core sectors, we needed to ensure our next press investment would enable us to continue to compete effectively in this rapidly changing market. As part of the deal, manroland will also be upgrading Kingston Carton's existing ROLAND 700 HiPrint through its futureproof package, including converting the press to ColourMetrics, integrating a PilotPlus monitoring system and retrofitting a QuickChange clamp to the HiPrint's coating unit. Kingston Carton has also signed up to manroland's printservices ProServ maintenance contract including TelePresence, its 24/7 internet-based remote diagnosis system and will be supplied with pressroom products from the manufacturer's printcom division. Concludes Norman Revill, Managing Director, manroland GB: "This is a fantastic announcement to make on the back of a successful Northprint exhibition and it's very exciting to have now sold our first DirectDrive press in the UK packaging sector. Like all sectors of the print industry, packaging is experiencing the twin demands for lower, more cost effective run lengths and faster, more efficient productivity. This is exactly what our DirectDrive technology has been designed to achieve, and I'm sure it will enable Kingston Carton to increase its business in these competitive sectors, confident in the knowledge that it has a printing technology that can support even the most ambitious growth plans."