Xerox Expands EA Toner Plant

Xerox will increase its emulsion aggregation (EA) toner capacity by 40 percent with the completion of a nearly $35 million expansion project to help Xerox keep pace with growing EA toner product demand.

The expansion has increased the plant size from 100,000 square feet to 155,000 square-feet, and added about $26 million in EA toner manufacturing equipment. Xerox and local officials participated in the official opening this week.

“From the first xerographic image over 75 years ago, Xerox has been reengineering the way people work and expanding this toner plant represents an opportunity to meet the high demand for our innovative solution,” said Richard Schmachtenberg, senior vice president, Consumables Development and Manufacturing for Xerox.

Developed by Xerox and protected by more than 300 patents, EA toner produces sharper images using less toner per page. Unlike traditional toner, which is created by physically grinding composite polymeric materials to micron-sized particles, EA toner is chemically grown enabling the size, shape and structure of the particles to be precisely controlled. This leads to improved print quality, less toner usage, less toner waste and less energy required for manufacturing and for printing. Xerox and Fuji Xerox have designed around 50 office and production printing products that use EA toner.

According to InfoTrends, between 2013 and 2018 production digital color toner-based pages will grow at a 6.2 percent compound annual growth rate, amounting to 295 billion pages globally by 2018, which presents a sizable opportunity for the chemically grown toners used in Xerox production devices.

Construction on the plant addition began in 2013, and the new manufacturing line and new toner filling line is expected to create about 54 new jobs, consisting of process operators, quality control, lab personnel and additional maintenance staff. The project also generated about 70 full-time construction jobs over the past 15 months.

Schmachtenberg also credited a number of local and state agencies for their support in making the addition a reality for the Rochester area:

County of Monroe Industrial Development Agency
Empire State Development Corporation
Rochester Gas and Electric
New York State Energy Research and Development Authority
New York State Investment Tax Credit

The current five-story plant, which opened in 2007, is one of only a handful of its kind in the world. It features more than 29 miles of pipe, over 100 stainless steel tanks and includes nearly 11,000 sensors that track information about temperature, humidity, air flow and other variables.

Xerox has invested $120 million in the plant, mostly in custom manufacturing process equipment.

Source: Xerox.