Bicentenarian KBA is shrugging off part of its web-offset heritage with the launch of a new corporate identity based only on the names of the group's founders.

Literally central to this is a specially-designed ampersand which - apart from the new Koenig & Bauer company logo - made its debut last week in a three-metre-high cast column outside the group's new demo centre. It symbolises, the company says, values which include 'tradition & innovation', 'requirements & technologies', 'approachability & professionalism'.

Gone is the 'A' of KBA, derived from the 1990 merger of Schnellpressenfabrik Albert & Hamm (Albert-Frankenthal), the offset and gravure business established in 1861 by former K&B master craftsman Andreas Albert and his partner.

Presses also get a subtler, more coordinated design.

Meanwhile those attending an international press conference in the Vogel Convention Center on September 21 heard how acquisitions of the last 25 years had moved the company's focus from media-oriented markets - such as newspaper, book, magazine and catalogue printing - to packaging.

Chief executive Claus Bolza-Schünemann said today's Koenig & Bauer AG had 33 subsidiaries, 12 of which produce their own products for their own customers.

"We see the company anniversary as an ideal time to place all activities of the group, from classic printing to digital printing - including prepress and post-press and top service - under a strong common roof again."

The relaunch is intended to strengthen employees' pride in the history of the company, including those who have joined through acquisitions.

Almost 700 guests celebrated the anniversary, many also visiting the Würzburg plant, with its new demo centre for digital and flexo presses, and displays of historical and current presses. A 'circular motion' press from 1868 printed an engraving of the company's birthplace at the Oberzell monastery, a Super Orloff intaglio press printed a specimen banknote, and a RotaJET L digital web printed - among other things, a 2200 mm long poster of the Würzburg-born Dallas basketball star Dirk Nowitzki. Also on show was the world's largest inkjet press, an HP T1100S, which printed a 2800 mm wide topliner for corrugated board.

A multimedia show presented the company's history from 1817 to the present, and an employee evening in the large marquee, and an open day for visitors at which more than 10,000 were expected, rounded off the anniversary programme.

Koenig & Bauer is following many partnerships in using an ampersand as the short form of its brand name, for which a new 'squeezed' font will be used. Also new is the claim, "we're on it", which Bolza-Schünemann says represents a mission to "bring together what moves our customers forward".

Pictured: Historic print samples from the visitors' gift-box; and the new logo