Packaging South Asia

While 7, 8 and even 10-color gravure and flexo presses have been used in India for flexible packaging and labels, more than 6-color plus coater presses have only just started being used for carton printing. Until a couple of years ago, a 6-color plus coater was the standard monocarton press. The higher configuration presses including interdeck and end-of-press UV were imported for printing on metalized polyester laminated to paperboard and also sometimes for printing on transparent or translucent plastic substrates.

Under an agreement signed recently between All India Federation of Master Printers (AIFMP) and Beijing Institute of Graphic Communication (BIGC) to provide training in 3D printing and print electronics, a batch of seven trainees left for China on 20 May 2017.  The highly subsidized training schedule has been specially fabricated for the members and other print entrepreneurs of the country.

Avery Dennison Corporation recently announced the appointment of Gregory S Lovins to senior vice president and chief financial officer. Lovins will be responsible for leading financial operations across Avery Dennison, and will also oversee the company's information technology group.

The Uflex cylinder engraving division has, after three years of intense R&D, been able to optimize cell structures of laser-engraved rotogravure cylinders to an extent that can actually reduce ink consumption by about 20-25% than what can be achieved using electro-mechanically engraved cylinders for similar image quality. In fact, the print quality achieved with the higher definition laser-engraved cylinders is enhanced in comparison to print using electro-mechanically engraved cylinders.

PackPlus, which will be held from 3-6 August 2017 at Pragati Maidan, New Delhi, will see 375 companies spread across six halls over an area of 16,000 square meters. The event is expected to receive more than 20,000 visitors.

Mumbai-based SP Ultraflex has achieved good success with its latest Roboslit dual turret slitter-rewinder in the past year. “In the last financial year, we achieved good sales,” says Biku Kohli, director of SP Ultraflex. “As always, it is a rewarding experience to see projections and estimates being substantiated on the floor, one after the other at the plants of leading flexible packaging companies.”

Like many other small but fast growing packaging film manufacturers from India, Surat-based Alpha Plastomers too has been aggressively working towards expanding its market share in developed regions of the world, such as USA and Europe. A leading manufacturer of flexible packaging solutions like POF shrink films and speciality products such as collation shrink films and mulch films, Alpha has participated in interpack for the second time. The company has two manufacturing plants located at Daman and Roorkee, and has a combined production capacity for shrink films of about 300 tons per month, which is expected to increase to 600 tons per month by next year. Alpha also manufactures PET bottles but currently has no plans to bring those to the international market.

The winners of the Metpack Innovation Awards 2017 were presented their gold, silver and bronze trophies on the afternoon of 3 May 2017, at the Panorama room at the exhibition. Innovative content, cost savings and improved quality were the criteria against which the international jury from nine nations, chaired by Gernot Geldner, judged each of the 26 individual entries to this year's competition. The winner of the Gold Innovation Award was won by the Italian company PrintabLED for its high-performance UV-LED systems for paint and metal printing systems.

Avon Pacfo Services, a startup in the packaging and shipping materials segment, offers products and services to customers with big and small orders alike. Unlike most startups that go through a process of uphill task during the initial years, Avon Pacfo began on a strong note with adequate investment and infrastructure. The new venture is a division of Faridabad-based Avon Containers, a leading converter of corrugated shipping and packaging material, founded by Gaurav Agarwal, managing director of Avon Containers and  Himanshu Bhansali, former general manager at Umex Packaging.

In the second half of February 2017, the Israel-based Landa Group and the Germany-based Altana Group announced the latter's acquisition of Landa’s metallography technology for an undisclosed consideration. First unveiled by Landa at its own stand at drupa 2016, the novel technology is claimed to be a sustainable alternative to foil-transfer processes, enabling metallization of graphics at up to half the cost of conventional foil stamping.