At Pack Expo in Chicago we met Constantia Flexibles, a global leader that seems quite happy with its Indian investments in the gravure-driven businesses of Parikh Packaging and more recently in Creative Polypack. While the investment in Constantia Parikh was made in 2013, the investment in Creative Polypack was made earlier this year (2018). Together the plants in Ahmedabad, Baddi, Kanpur, Kolkata, Assam and Puducherry give Constantia a
broad reach and comprehensive flexible packaging capacity in Western, Northern, Eastern and Southern India.
Nikolaus Wolfram, senior vice president Corporate Development, Innovation & Marketing of Constantia Flexibles was forthcoming at Pack Expo about the company’s integration of Creative Polypack, the development of an Indian R&D hub and about the greenfield CI-flexo based plant that it is building in Ahmedabad. Wolfram said, “India for us is really a development hub both for India and for outside the country. We are creating a real R&D hub and this is something that has really gone better than we anticipated. We started this effort in a structured way about 18 months ago and it works both ways. The cooperation with our European R&D has gone well and we get a lot of inputs for Europe from our Indian R&D, especially in areas such as down-gauging in which they are really very good.”
According to Wolfram, recyclability is a global trend that is irreversible. Referring to the Ecolam, Ecolam Standard and Ecolam High Plus solution on display at the company’s Pack Expo stand, he said, “We truly believe that with PE we have a solution ready, that works. We have PE solutions for everything including food packaging with the Ecolam High Plus, which has a near aluminum barrier using metalization but which is recyclable. While it is good for food contact and easy to recycle, it cannot be recycled for food contact but for many other products including toys.”
The discussion about the new plant coming up in Ahmedabad also emphasized the opportunity to be sustainable using polyethylene films and laminates. Wolfram said, “Polyethylene is by far the largest and widest material for packaging and applications. For us polyester is at a huge disadvantage as a material because it is not heat sealable. In fact, the polyester recycling stream is actually designed for food contact and these recyclers only accept bottles and do not accept flexibles.
Regarding the greenfield plant in Ahmedabad, Wolfram revealed that the building is almost finished and should be ready by the end of the year. The machinery will come in around June and July of 2019 and he expects the plant to be fully running in Q3 and Q4 of 2019 – certainly toward the end of 2019.
The new plant including blown film lines and a wide web (1 meter plus) CI flexo press along with the accessory lamination and converting equipment is designed for producing 100 million square meters of flexible packaging for the Indian and export markets annually.
Regarding the overall progress of Constantia in India, Wolfram said, “The integration with Creative is going well and the company was already very strong in non-food products. We have a very strong position in hygiene in India and we want to leverage this back to Europe, Africa and other regions. I believe the market in Europe is ready to take products from India. A strong reputation and distribution in Europe is the key to making this work. Constantia has the knowhow and we have a name and we can make this happen. Interestingly, in the US they are more ready to buy from India than the Europeans and this is also gaining speed for us. This is another reason why we are here at Pack Expo.”
