The Times of India, is the the world’s largest English-language broadsheet newspaper. A contract has been placed with Ferag for the The Times of India, is the the world’s largest English-language broadsheet newspaper. A contract has been placed with Ferag for the delivery and installation of two inserting lines for Mumbai, a second contract covers two conveyor and packaging systems for the Sahibabad printing centre near New Delhi and another contract covers the packaging systems for Chennai. The contract signed at the IfraExpo 2007 in Vienna in October, is the biggest ever to be awarded by an Indian newspaper house for mailroom technology.

The Indian division of Ifra invited me to speak at the 2007 Conference inRichard Saldanha, Executive Director of the Times Group and Susanne Rau-Reist, WRH Walter Reist Holding AG, shaking hands after signing of the contract at IfraExpo 2007 in Vienna.

The fastest route to the market
For the Times of India, supplement business is not new territory. Currently, supplements and advertising is inserted manually at the point of sale into circulations that run into millions. According to Richard Saldanha, Executive Director of the Times Group, industrialisation of the inserting process is crucial for two reasons: “The growing market requirement on zoning calls for speedy and efficient handling of voluminous supplements. Ferag's inserting systems offer a futuristic solution to decisively address the demands on the supply chain.”

The second criterion crucial to the investment decision was cost effectiveness: “India's economy is experiencing 8 per cent annual growth, while labour cost is growing at an ever faster rate. We will only manage to keep pace with this huge development step through innovation,” says Parnendu Sen, Technical Director.

“Ferag is the best strategic partner”
The Times of India is today producing in Bangalore, Hyderabad, Mumbai and two printing centres in New Delhi with Ferag mailroom technology. The lines in Bangalore and Mumbai have been readied for integration of MultiSertDrum systems ahead of the expansion in the inserting process. “For us, Ferag is the best strategic partner on the road to process industrialisation”, says Mohit Jain, Director (Business & Commercial). “Thanks to the private ownership structure of Ferag, which allows it to take a long term view on technology development, gives us full confidence in its ability to innovate. On all levels, the people who work here are distinguished by team spirit, commitment, and great technical ability. What is more, by enabling interesting advertising formats like MemoStick or MemoFlag to be integrated into the system, Ferag offers us huge potential for technological development. All of which gives us the security we need as a company going forward”, explains Mohit Jain.

In production by the second half of 2008
The two high-performance MSD-M 2:1 series inserting drums on order are destined for the Airoli (Thane) printing centre near Mumbai and set to start production in the second half of 2008. Both lines will be connected via UTR conveyor technology to the folder deliveries on two newspaper presses and configured for an inserting performance of up to 65,000 cph in online mode and a capacity of nine different inserts. In each case, two four-station RollStream lines incorporating the JetFeeder hopper will be used as the feed periphery.

As part of a second order and within the same time-scale, the Times of India is set to expand the Sahibabad production facility at New Delhi by two UTR conveyor systems, eight MultiStack stackers and eight of the latest generation of SmartStrap strapping machines. Four of the eight production lines will be equipped with the LineMaster II line control for programmed bundling.

3.4 million per day
As the largest English-language broadsheet newspaper in the world, the number of Times of India copies sold each day is 3.4 million and thus comes in well ahead of USA Today. The Times of India is owned by Bennett, Coleman & Co. Ltd., a family concern run by Mrs Indu Jain and sons Mr Samir Jain and Mr Vineet Jain. The group publishes dailies titles including The Economic Times, Mumbai Mirror, the Hindi-language Navbharat Times, and the Maharastra Times, which appears in the Marathi language. The Times group is an integrated media house with strong presence in Internet, TV, Magazines, Outdoor Advertising and Fm radio business.