Swiss machinery manufacturer Pantec GS Systems (formerly GS Engineering) has sold its first hot-foil embossing machine system for use with self-adhesive labels.

The Rhino machine system has been developed for flat hot-foil embossing on reel material. Hot-foil embossing combines the traditional dual process of hot-foil stamping and embossing into a single process.

Pantec's first Rhino machine has been sold to an Italian wine label manufacturer, which is integrating the kit into a Nilpeter MO-4 and which will go online next month.

Pantec said the new kit achieves better results than conventional rotary systems, especially on open structured papers.

"Rhino produces, even with cost-effective flat stamping foil, at 15,000 cycles per hour (100m per minute) of glossy, precisely registered foil and embossing combinations, which add a first-class appearance, especially to wine labels," said Peter Frei, Pantec's general manager.

Due to its high operating speed, the machine can be integrated into rotary and semi-rotary printing machines without affecting performance, the company said.

"Due to the simultaneous application of foil and embossing, plus the longer retention time in flat hot-foil embossing, the brilliance of the brightness is apparently better than in conventional two-track processing," Frei added.

The company claims that the machine's revolving foil head enables it to produce complex designs that would have previously been prohibitively expensive. The Rhino enables the creation in a single step of two- and multi-colour designs with interleaved foil and blind embossing.