Au Kitane Koehler Attains Fogra Certification

Aurora Kitane-Koehler, a former PPTF lecturer and a familiar name in the Philippine printing industry has recently successfully passed the Fogra certification exam for proofing in July 14-15 2009 held at Ratingen, Germany. The certification was facilitated by Fogra, a globally recognized organization composed of over 700 members whose objective is to promote print engineering and its future-oriented technologies in the fields of research, development and application, and to enable the printing industry to utilize the results of this activity. The organization’s members represent graphic art business operating in fields ranging from prepress through to bookbinding, and suppliers, a third of which are members outside Germany.

Aurora was fortunate enough to have been given the chance to take this certification. Now, she totally understands what Fogra has been rallying all these years and the reason why the European community is uniting to achieve one standard.

”While learning the details of the ISO standards for printing, I can’t help thinking about our Philippine printing industry. How I wish our printers start realizing these standards so we can compete internationally as some of our neighboring countries are already doing like China and India. By complying with such standards, we make every printing company equally competitive producing the same quality prints as with those produced in Europe or in the US. Why concentrate on the local market, look at the big picture” – Aurora.

Au, as most of the people in the industry knows her, has been working professionally in the field of graphic arts for almost 17 years. She had her early exposure in the business as a young child working for her father’s printing house every summer ‘with pay’ at the bindery department. She did not know that this would eventually mold her mind to take the same path as her father’s, Boy Kitane, who is a familiar and respectable figure in the Philippine printing industry.

After she graduated from the University of the Philippines, Diliman, she immediately joined the family business and in between worked for an Apple distributor and a local graphic arts machineries and supplies company. In 1996, she joined INGRIN (International Graphic Arts in the Netherlands), through PPTF and the INGRIN foundation for a 3-month graphic arts upgrade training program, which was her first exposure to the European graphic arts industry. This was followed by an update program in 1999.

With her broad exposure in the graphic arts business, both locally and internationally, she unselfishly shared her knowledge to the industry by actively participating in PPTF as a regular lecturer particularly in the area of digital prepress. She has also organized well-attended seminars with both PPTF and PIAP, and in addition, has contributed her expertise to PIBFI for its skills standardization and trade testing projects.

Not only did the printing industry have a great influence in Au’s career but also did it have an impact in her personal life.  In 2004, she married Florian Koehler, a German national who was formerly with Best Color (now EFI), whom she met in one of PIAP’s Printing Update seminars when he was invited as a resource speaker in color management system. 

Au continued to focus in the same field even after leaving the Philippines. In Singapore, she worked for global companies - a UK-based label-printing company, WorldMark, and a New Zealand company, Quickcut, where she was recognized by her management and colleagues for her outstanding contributions and efforts.

Today, Aurora is working for EFI Germany, as Technical Support Engineer for proofing, taking care of all non-German EFI dealers in Europe. Within 1 1/2 years, she adapted to the German culture and EFI business culture, gaining respect and recognition from her management and colleagues. Aurora has once again proved her expertise in prepress with continuous positive feedback from customers for her reliability and professionalism in handling their proofing support issues. 

With her recent Fogra certification, she has definitely made another milestone not only for herself but also for the Philippine printing industry who is proud for Aurora’s passion and dedication to the graphic arts.