Pantone, Inc. is the world-renowned authority on colour and provider of colour systems and leading technology for the selection and accurate communication of colour. The PANTONE Name is known worldwide as the standard language for colour communication from designer to manufacturer to retailer to customer. With 40 years of experience, we are the worldwide market leader in colour communication and colour technology for the graphic design, printing, publishing, textile and plastics industries.

Whether you are creating a logo, a product, packaging, an ad, the latest fashion trend or a vision, we have the tools and solutions for keeping your colours accurate and consistent cross-media, around the world. The PANTONE Color language is the most universally understood standard available.

MARKETS & PRODUCTS

Each year, innumerable products and services are sold by Pantone and its hundreds of licensees in over 100 countries in the graphic arts, textile, apparel, interior, plastics, architectural and industrial design markets.

Graphic Arts - Printing, Publishing & Packaging
The PANTONE MATCHING SYSTEM is the definitive international reference for selecting, specifying, matching and controlling ink colours. The PANTONE formula guide, a three-guide set consisting of 1,114 solid PANTONE Colors on coated, uncoated and matte stock, shows corresponding printing ink formulas for each colour, and the three-book set of solid chips provides coated, uncoated and matte perforated tear-out chips that can be used for quality control.

The digitally-created PANTONE Process Color System® chips and guides provide a comprehensive palette of more than 3,000 colours achievable in four-colour (CMYK) process printing. The PANTONE solid to process guide compares a solid PANTONE Color to the closest possible match in CMYK four-colour process that can be achieved on a computer monitor, output device or printing press. Other PANTONE Color Reference Guides for the graphic arts include metallics, pastels, tints, duotones, film and foil.

The PANTONE Hexachrome® Color System, a patented, breakthrough six-colour ultra high quality printing process, reproduces a dynamic range of more brilliant continuous-tone images and simulates brighter, more vivid colours than standard four-colour process printing. The Hexachrome process is supported by industry leaders such as Adobe, Quark, Macromedia, Kodak Polychrome, Agfa, DuPont, Polaroid and Fuji.

Textiles
The PANTONE Textile Color System® is a vital tool for designers in the apparel, home furnishings and interior design industries for selecting and specifying colour used in the manufacture of textiles and fashion. The System - consisting of 1,932 colours in cotton or paper format - is ideal for assembling creative palettes and conceptual colour schemes, and for providing colour communication and control in the manufacturing process.

The PANTONE VIEW Colour Planner is a bi-annual trend forecasting tool that offers seasonal colour direction and inspiration 24 months in advance for multiple usages, including menswear, women's wear, active wear, cosmetics and industrial design.

Architecture and Interiors
PANTONE for architecture and interiors bowed at NeoCon in 2002, marking its move into the commercial, industrial and hospitality segments of the interior design industry. The System allows designers to connect different categories within the industry, including flooring, leather, fabrics, carpet, fiber, furniture and laminates. Pantone is collaborating with leading manufacturers and design firms to integrate the PANTONE for architecture and interiors colour system into their design process.

Plastics
The PANTONE PLASTICS Color System™ allows designers, manufacturers and suppliers who work with plastics to select, specify, control and manufacture hundreds of colours through opaque and transparent plastic colour chips in the system. It offers a comprehensive colour range that is reproducible in plastics.

Color Cue™
Introduced in 2001, PANTONE Color Cue is a portable, affordable spectro-colorimeter preprogrammed with PANTONE MATCHING SYSTEM Color data. It instantly identifies the closest PANTONE Color of any flat surface and provides formulas for reproduction in four-colour process printing, Hexachrome® six-colour printing and Web design, accelerating colour management workflow for graphics specialists, pre-press professionals, printers, Web site designers, photographers and retailers. PANTONE Color Cue has applications in many industries: Graphic designers can immediately determine a PANTONE Color and its values for print and the Web. Printers can sample colour to identify to the closest PANTONE Color standard. Retailers can swiftly and easily identify and communicate colour across marketing materials, catalogs and Web sites. A version of the Color Cue, PANTONE Color Cue TX, supports the PANTONE Textile Color System.

Retail
In 2001, Pantone launched its PANTONE TheRightColor™ division. By providing a universal and precise colour language along with technology solutions, TheRightColor focuses on developing solutions and technologies that enable retailers to build a colour standard infrastructure to improve the consumer's shopping experience and impact the vendor's bottom line across all distribution channels. TheRightColor solutions are based on the globally accepted PANTONE Textile Color System.

TheRightColor solutions enable retailers to reduce the number of returns due to inaccurate colour representation, as well as improve inventory tracking and replenishment strategies. In addition, the ability to monitor customer colour preferences enables upselling and cross-selling, allowing the retailer to sell more product per visit. Meanwhile, the use of PANTONE Color codes empowers the customer to more confidently coordinate and complement merchandise. More information is available at www.therightcolor.com.

Consumer
PANTONE UNIVERSE is a collection of lifestyle products based on fashion colour trends for the consumer. The collection, consisting of stationery items, travel gear, accessories and rainwear, combines timeless designs and modern materials with current trend colours. Products, which are updated seasonally based on trends, are accompanied by "emotional colour cues." More information is available at www.pantoneuniverse.com.

PANTONE Shopping Color Guide lets shoppers take the expertise and precision of the PANTONE Name wherever they go. Based on the PANTONE Textile Color System, the PANTONE Shopping Color Guide incorporates 1,757 colours into an easy-to-use fan guide that helps shoppers coordinate colours for every aspect of their shopping experience - from clothing to accessories to items for the home.

Color Management
In 2001, Pantone entered a marketing alliance with ColorVision, a Datacolour company, to provide affordable digital colour control to graphic artists and designers, photographers and printers, offering exclusive product bundles for photo, design, Web and pre-press applications. The flagship product of the PANTONE COLORVISION® line is the award-winning Spyder™, an all-digital, seven-filter colorimeter that supports both LCD and CRT monitors.

Software
A longtime pioneer in the realm of digital technology, Pantone offers a variety of software products that accurately translate PANTONE Colors for use by graphic designers, pre-press professionals, business users, Web developers and Internet surfers.

• PANTONE OfficeColor Assistant™ adds the impact of PANTONE Colors to reports, proposals and presentations created in Microsoft® PowerPoint®, Word and Excel.
• PANTONE ColorWeb® Pro lets designers point-and-click PANTONE MATCHING SYSTEM Colors into Web authoring software, HTML editors and presentation software.
• The PANTONE Hexachrome Color System is supported by PANTONE HexWare® plug-ins for Adobe® Photoshop® and Adobe Illustrator®.

Lights and Scales
PANTONE Color Viewing Lights allow the user to preview colour choices in different lighting conditions.

PANTONE formula scales are pre-programmed with formulas for all PANTONE Colors, including pastels and metallics, and are available in various sizes for small, medium and large print shops.

RESEARCH & DEVELOPMENT LABS

Pantone supports its colour communications systems with industry-specific research and testing labs.

• Ink Lab scientists develop new formulas to update the PANTONE Color palettes. Licensee samples are also tested for quality control.
• Colour Technology and Application Lab researchers develop core colour technology and maintain the integrity of Pantone-licensed products from companies such as Adobe, Hewlett-Packard, Epson, DuPont and Kodak Polychrome.
• Textile Lab technicians verify formulas for textile production and formulas for reproduction. They dye and prepare fabric for the PANTONE Textile Color System swatch books, as well as provide custom colour dying services to textile clients.
• Electronic Colour Systems Lab engineers develop systems and calibration devices to assist software and hardware manufacturers in the DTP world with creating products and systems that support device-independent colour standards. The lab evaluates colour consistency and provides licensees with tools and data sets.

Custom Colour Services
PANTONE Custom Colour Services provide custom colour standards for corporate managers and art directors in fashion, home, contract design, paint, beauty, automotive, sports, pharmaceutical - any industry requiring colour accuracy.

PANTONE Custom Colour Services also provides products to specify corporate identity, product colour and packaging standards, including colour standards showing one or more PANTONE Colors or custom colours on paper, cotton or custom substrates, as well as the corresponding CMYK, HTML and RGB values.

COLORTEAM(sm)
The Pantone COLORTEAM defines and develops colour messages to help companies better connect with their customers by delivering a full suite of customized services from shade naming to interactive Colour Workshops to in-depth Colour Ideation for product development. List of services: colour-on-call, colourtalk seminars, colourlab, colour choice validation, colour ideation, colour shade / naming, and colour technology.