The Future of PSI

PSI Continues to Live and Thrive

Last year, we announced that EFI™ PSI was going into maintenance mode, and Version 13.0 (v13.0) would be the last major release. After several user group meetings where we reviewed our roadmap for the upcoming years, we realized that we had several major enhancements still to come.

PSI™ v13.0 introduced Digital Workflow - Phase I, which allowed users to price and plan digital work for color and black and white devices, while incorporating new processes and inventory functionality. PSI v13.0 also introduced Product Master for sheet-fed, web and digital to complement our existing flexo functionality. This feature allows users to create estimates and jobs with up-to-date costs for processes and materials quickly and efficiently. This new enhancement also enables us to introduce the Finished Goods Direct Order Workflow. By linking a Product Master to a Finished Goods item, you can create a production job to replenish inventoried materials when your availability is less than the user demand.

In addition, we now have the ability to track FedEx and UPS shipments and choose whether or not you’re required to edit Unassigned Time. Last but not least, we added integration to EFI Digital StoreFront® for Web-to-print capability, all while stabilizing the core system.

So what’s the point of having a Phase I if you’re not going to introduce a Phase II? None, so we’re introducing Digital Workflow - Phase II in PSI v13.1 to allow for spot color, roll-to-sheet, and roll-to-roll capabilities. Also, in v13.1, users will be able to create Hybrid Quotes or Orders. This feature will allow you to create a multi-part estimate or job that uses different printing methods such as digital and sheet-fed or web and flexo all in one order. We also are adding FSC/SFI options, which will allow certified print shops the ability to track and report FSC or SFI jobs. We plan to add material usage functionality by allowing grams as unit of measurement for inks and have added over 20 additional user group requested enhancements, but we’re not done yet.

PSI v2010.1 will introduce flexo enhancements for non die-centric production, metric units of measurement, EFI Jetrion® capabilities and more voted on user enhancements. With the version number convention change, we also will change our focus. Starting with v2010.1, we will solicit our users to help shape and guide the feature enhancements for future releases. The future of PSI will literally be planned out by our users.

As you can see, v13.0 will not be the last major release by a long shot. We’ve got a lot of new and exciting features coming in the next few releases. Stay tuned!