Acknowledging over 30 years of achievements in the ink industry, the National Association of Printing Ink Manufacturers (NAPIM) bestowed a Printing Ink Pioneer Award to INX International Ink Co. executive Jim Bailen at its Centennial Convention’s awards and black tie dinner, held March 23 in Ponte Vedra Beach, Fla.

Bailen has served as lead project engineer for every major facility expansion and equipment installation INX International has instituted over the last 20 years. His team has completed the design and managed construction of three recent multi-million production facility projects in the U.S. and overseas. He has served as the company’s vice president of engineering since 1999.

“Jim has an extremely observant eye to find safety situations and engineer safer ways to make ink,” says Rick Clendenning, INX President and CEO. “Jim has pioneered many developments over the years and truly deserves recognition for his contributions to the industry. Without him in this role, we would not be where we are today as a company with our world-class manufacturing facilities.”

In 1984, Bailen joined CPS, the in-house ink division of Sullivan Graphics in Dunkirk, N. Y. and began work as an electrical supervisor in the maintenance department. Sakata INX acquired CPS from Sullivan in 1990, and it later became part of the INX International family.

In 2004, he oversaw completion of the new modern metal decorating facility in Charlotte, N.C. that produces ink for customers around the world. Four years later, he did the same for the new liquid ink plant in Homewood, Ill. that produces water-based technologies. New media mill grinding equipment was introduced at these facilities, a pivotal outcome that Bailen played a major role in.

He pioneered the development of intrinsic production safety devices for ink production equipment, introducing the Nip Guard Safety Interlock System that assures no 3-roll mill at INX can be run in cleaning mode. Since 2004, Bailen has served on the NAPIM/ANSI B65 Equipment Safety Committees that has developed several safety standards, including the 3-roll mills, to help guide equipment manufacturers to construct safer machines.

Bailen established the development of the INX TPM elements for planned maintenance and early equipment planning within the company, which included the training of maintenance personnel at all facilities. He also developed an engineering design and installation program for all new equipment at INX International.

Bailen has actively supported NAPIM for many years. In 2002, he presented at the NAPIM Manufacturing Symposium a paper on “Equipment automation and data collection system designs.” The same year, he began serving on the pilot committee for the Manufacturing Symposium and did so through 2004. He also served for two years on the NAPIM Equipment Safety committee and presented a paper on the “Failure Mode Effect and Criticality Analysis” at the NPIRI Technical Conference in 2006.

INX International Ink Co.

(630) 382-1800

 www.inxinternational.com