Hybrid Software has acquired the IC3D and related technology from Creative Edge for $4 million. IC3D is a 3D preview software that allows designers to build virtual objects and to test packaging and lighting for them, before committing to models and real life concepts. It shaves huge amounts of time and cost from packaging development cycles.
The acquisition cements a long standing relationship between this software and Hybrid’s PackZ and Cloudflow packaging workflows and allows the founders of Creative Edge, principally co founder Trevor Haworth and former CEO Nick Gilmore, who retained his equity stake after retirement, to step away from the business.
The IC3D software has become more powerful in recent years and thanks to advances in cloud computing technology, much faster with full scale renders. It can replicate labels, shrink sleeves, rigid and flexible packaging, instore displays and on shelf visualisation with a full range of lighting and lens effects. The virtual images can be used in pre launch advertising and presentations before the product is ready for market.
The software sits alongside the electronics and printhead drivers for additive manufacture – 3D printing – from Meteor, which Hybrid CEO Mike Rottenborn calls “one of our fastest growing markets”. He adds: “Visualisation of packaging designs in 3D was a gap in our technology portfolio. The acquisition of IC3D strengthens our 3D offering and closes the loop between the design of high end labels and packaging and industrial print manufacturing.
“Both brands and designers are a new area of focus for our group and we look forward to building on what IC3D has already begun. But it also serves a function in production, once the printing method is determined. For example, when a shrink sleeve is applied to a package, the shrinking process distorts the artwork so it must be compensated for distortion before printing. IC3D already integrates with our PackZ PDF editor to display the effects of shrinking and distortion in real time.”
Haworth remains with the business as CEO. “Our acquisition by Hybrid Software Group is the logical step in co-development of some exciting new products for the packaging market and I look forward to our expansion under the additional resources provided by such a successful group,” he says.
Rottenborn adds: “Creative Edge and IC3D have been partners for quite a few years and they were always a part of our larger growth strategy, but first we needed to acquire Hybrid Software and ColorLogic. With that behind us, IC3D was a natural fit with Hybrid Software Group.”
The Creative Edge development team is divided between the US and UK and will become part of the Hybrid Software organisations in those countries, though continuing to work on future developments of the software. The IC3D brand will be retained.
