This series seeks out companies that custom-develop inkjet printing solutions. The fundamentals of inkjet integration have been laid out in the introductory article. Each interview is consistent, examining the company basics and the typical types of solutions they offer. Most integrators will happily evaluate solution requirements not covered in their core markets. Previous articles covered MCS, Integrity Industrial Inkjet, DJM, Bergstein and NEOS. This time we provide C-marx.
C-marx, the company
C-marx is a relatively young company, founded in 2020 in Chemnitz, Germany – just before the onset of the Covid pandemic. The founders have a background in printing press engineering and digital print for functional surfaces as well as in business management. The sole focus of the company is on inkjet solutions, which are all customer-specified.
Today the company has nine employees and its own production and test facilities, located in the Technology Park in Chemnitz. Design capabilities include mechanical components, software, and system integration. More than 10 systems have been installed in the relatively short history of the company.
Applications and markets served
For its printing solutions, C-marx has the tagline “printing beyond colour”. This pretty much sums up the target of supplying custom inkjet solutions for functional print, where certain properties are more important than appearance.
Markets served to date are:
- Coding and marking on demanding surfaces (plastic cards, ceramics)
- Additive Manufacturing
- Direct-to-shape printing
- Functional print (including fuel cell components, adhesives, electronics, or biomaterials)
- Braille print
The customer segments are diverse. They reach from universities and research institutes to technology companies and industrial customers. Due to the nature of the solutions offered, printing companies are rarely targeted so far.
Printing unit for raised surface print used in license plate production, shown at drupa 2024
Technologies and devices
Solutions delivered by C-marx can either be stand-alone printers or inkjet solutions integrated into existing print or production lines. Offered are roll-to-roll, sheet-to-sheet, or direct-to-shape solutions.
There are two more standardised products offered. The Printbar system includes an array of Seiko inkjet heads and the necessary automation and maintenance features such as capping, cleaning, and purging, including standard software. Additional mechanical and software integration is offered as well. The other product is an inkjet table-top proofing device, that can be equipped with different inkjet heads, types of fluids, and drying/curing assemblies. The proofer is targeted at research institutions.
Most activity is in custom designed solutions, however. The applications cover a fairly wide range of industries. For efficient fuel-cell production, a roll-to-roll production line has been devised using two types of inkjet heads from different vendors (Seiko and Fujifilm) to jet two types of inks with certain chemical properties. The installation included a complete workflow integration.
Roll-to-roll integration of two inkjet head types in fuel cell production with 320mm web width
Additive manufacturing is also covered, for example by developing a binderjet set-up using renewable resources such as plant-based fibres as raw materials – as required by the customer.
Renewable and recycled raw materials for 3D-print and printed sample components
A cross-over product from coding/marking and braille applications is a printer in development for vehicle license plates. The print unit was shown at drupa 2024. Authorities require the characters on a license plate to have a certain height, which is traditionally achieved by embossing the metal plate. The printer proposed by C-marx simply prints the required height. Both single-pass or multi-pass print units are possible.
Depending on the application requirements, C-marx is using heads from different inkjet head suppliers and is not tied to a specific vendor.
Inks and substrates
C-marx works with a variety of ink systems, including aqueous, UV, solvent, and specialty ink types. This includes demanding or “exotic” ink types for functional print. The company has competencies in drier and inkjet waveform design to support these inks. The inks are produced by 3rd party companies in the partner network.
Printers from C-marx are not limited to specific substrates – or in the case of additive manufacturing, none is needed. In effect, typical substrates are everything but paper, for which sufficient solutions in the market already exist.
Sales, service, and geographic coverage
C-marx is based in Germany and all sales & service is direct. Accordingly, most activity is in Germany and neighbouring countries. The company is taking on projects in other geographies as well, especially in Asia, often cooperating with partner companies.
What is setting C-marx apart?
Helped by the small company size, C-marx prides itself on the capability to react quickly to customer demands, even if the requirements are out of the ordinary.
The company has a large know-how in functional print. Accordingly, consulting customers and being able to recommend technology solutions is a key competency.
In addition, C-marx is a full-service provider and all print solutions, including complete production lines, can be sourced from one company.
C-marx is based in Chemnitz, Germany
Website https://www.C-marx.de/english/
Stay tuned for more coverage of inkjet integrators from around the world. See previous profiles:
MCS | Integrity Industrial Inkjet | DJM | Bergstein | NEOS