Serge Clauss · Product Manager – Software & Solutions · DURST Group · PRINTING United 2025

At Printing United in Orlando, Morten Reitoft from INKISH meets Serge Clauss from Durst at one of the company’s several booths — this one dedicated entirely to software. Serge explains how Durst’s Smart Factory ecosystem has evolved and why the company decided to split its core software into two distinct but fully integrated products: Prepare and Produce.

According to Serge, Smart Factory is an open, modular environment built on proven Durst technologies such as Lift ERP, Smart Shop, and PDF Editor, now expanded with the two new “babies.” Prepare handles file preparation, automation, preflighting, and bleed management, while Produce focuses on color management, ripping, and printer control. Both applications can operate independently or together, offering customers a seamless workflow and a clean, unified interface.

“The most important thing,” Serge explains, “is flexibility. If a customer already uses another preflight or workflow solution, they don’t have to replace it. They can integrate ours. The same goes for production — you can choose what fits your setup.” This modularity is enabled by a new generation of open APIs, allowing Smart Factory to connect with almost any external system.

Durst’s approach, Serge emphasizes, is to build an open ecosystem rather than a closed one. “We don’t want to be known as Durst-only software,” he says. “That’s why we’re showing an HP printer here on our booth — to demonstrate that our platform works with any device. Our goal is to give customers freedom of choice.”

He also highlights a new image-tracking solution designed to eliminate paper job tickets and make production tracking completely digital. “Once you cut a job, you often lose the printed information,” Serge says. “Now, you can scan the printed piece with a phone or tablet, and immediately access the full job ticket and production data. It’s fully system-agnostic and can connect to any workflow.”

Throughout the conversation, Serge returns to a central theme — integration over isolation. Durst isn’t trying to replace what printers already use; instead, it’s creating tools that connect everything together. “We’re not reinventing the wheel,” he says. “We’re giving customers a smarter, more connected way to use it.”