History

Grafitec company was established in 1991. An important milestone in the company's history was its the capital investment in Dobrušské strojírny a.s. in 1995, a company which in 1992 as part of a privatisation programme acquired a financial and legal independence and embarked on its own road of developing and manufacturing sheet-fed offset printing presses under the brand name Polly. This step strengthened Grafitec's position as a commercial entity and thus giving the company exclusivity as a distributor of Polly printing presses both on local and foreign markets. Ever since being a general distributor of Polly offset printing presses, Grafitec has always put an emphasis on building up and improving the quality of its foreign sales network, based on reputable and strong business partnerships. Approximately 70% of the entire Polly production is exported to 40 countries throughout the world. Major markets for Polly printing presses are Poland, USA, Russia, Germany and the United Kingdom. Other important markets for the company are the countries of Western Europe, Argentina, Brazil and China.

In 2000 Charles Investment Partners L.P (ChIP) of USA provided a contribution of capital into Grafitec ChIP, represented in the Czech Republic by Winslow Partners, s.r.o., is now a majority shareholder in Grafitec. The capital invested by ChIP has been used to finance research and development, it also supports launching new products and is used as a working capital.

In the second half of 2001 companiesGrafitec Praha, Grafitec Dobruška and Grik company merged. The task of the newly established company was to prepare its merge with the manufacturing plant Dobrušské strojírny planned for early 2002. The final result of this process will be a single company, named Grafitec, spol. s r.o.[Ltd] The purpose of this merge is to ease and simplify the communication flows within the company and in the customer relations area as well.

On 10th March 2005, the KBA group became the hundred percent owner of Grafitec. The acquisition is a part of the KBA strategy which aims to extend its activities also into the small-format printing presses segment, where it expects further growth.

Koenig & Bauer AG is a German multinational - the second largest printing presses producer in the world. KBA employs more than 7000 employees, primarily in Germany and the U.S.A. In 2004, company's turnover reached 1.423 billion Euro.

Apart from rotary presses and circular deep printing presses, KBA also offers the widest portfolio of sheet-fed offset presses on the world market, from small format (360 x 520 mm) to extra large formats (1510 x 2050 mm) for commercial printing, books, posters and covers. KBA Radebeul is the world leader in large-format printing presses. 90% of all bank notes in the world are being printed on KBA-GIORI machines.

KBA-Grafitec product range aptly complements KBA products Rapida 74, Rapida 74 G and 74 Karat, whose higher degree of automation, wider choice of options (including printing on plastic and cardboard), choice of finish and configuration appeals to more demanding customers. KBA-Grafitec Performa line focuses on small and mid-size printshops, printers on developing markets and new customers on the classical commercial multicolour printing market - three areas, in which KBA company sees a great growth potential.